
Samsung’s New TV Ad: Apple Fans Are Whiny Lemmings - jmartellaro
http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/samsungs_new_tv_ad_apple_fans_are_whiny_lemmings/
======
mgkimsal
Some of the comments from people in line are funny - it's a clever ad. I just
don't think it's gonna do all that much to stem the Apple/iPhone juggernaut
any time soon. The ecosystem around the iPhone is enormous - the cases,
adapters, accessories all will fit and work with pretty much any iPhone from
the last couple of years (tens of millions of them). Some hotels you go to now
have alarm clocks with iPod/iPhone docks in them. This is a device which is
being ingratiated in to society. A cute ad talking about a bigger screen is
probably not going to do much to sway people. Samsung coming up with a truly
different experience - say, in the way people buy the device - would get
converts. I'm thinking specifically of selling the device with no contract or
"subsidized" pricing schemes - just saying, hey this is $199, then taking a
cut of sales from an app market (bundle a kick-ass Samsung marketplace app and
start courting devs, for example). Or promoting Kindle on the bigger screen
and taking a few cents from each Kindle.

Or something - something different from what we've had from phone companies
for years. Model XYF573 - rev2! Now with more colors! Oh, and 4G! Then 2
months later that model isn't produced any more, and we're on to rev3, which
is a different form factor... wash, rinse, repeat. Yes, I exaggerate slightly,
but I got tired of trying to compare all the various specs some time ago.

I was a linux guy for years, and got tired of things not working, not being
mainstream, etc. I was a Linux guy when Windows was cool, then Linux when Mac
was cool. I finally caved in and went Mac. It's good - nay, just easier -
being part of the majority for a while. It's not that I don't think about my
tech choices, I just spend more time thinking about stuff at another level of
abstraction (get an iPhone, now decide which of the X thousand apps I want to
use to make my life better). Getting device X solely because of specs (bigger
screen!) generally won't make my life easier/better.

Apple is on top right now, just like MS/Windows was in the 90s. Something will
displace them in the next 10-15 years, but it won't be the Samsung Galaxy
$MODEL, and it won't be this ad.

~~~
GiraffeNecktie
That's an inadvertently funny post, considering how it reflects the less-than-
completely-well-informed opinions of the people in the TV ad. You write "I
just don't think it's gonna do all that much to stem the Apple/iPhone
juggernaut any time soon." You don't think so?
[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/samsung/8855070/Samsun...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/samsung/8855070/Samsung-
overtakes-Apple-smartphone-sales.html)

~~~
nhangen
This was before the 4S, which shattered iPhone 4 records.

~~~
fpgeek
Given that the iPhone is on more carriers and smartphone penetration has
dramatically increased in the past year, not shattering the iPhone 4 records
would have been a disaster for Apple. We won't know how successful the 4S
launch has been until we get data from the next quarter of smartphone sales.

------
benologist
MacObserver treat HN like a link dump, upvoting them will only encourage them
to keep exploiting HN for traffic and push submissions from legitimate
community members out of sight faster.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=jmartellaro>

<http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=digiwizard>

<http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=Semteksam>

<http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=davethenerd>

------
jaysonelliot
Have personal attacks on a product's customers ever succeeded?

People identify with the products they buy, whether it's a car, a computer, a
phone, running shoes, etc.

Have you ever had an argument with someone over their favorite brand? Telling
someone they bought the "wrong" brand is basically like telling them they're
stupid. Not the best way to endear yourself to them.

SanDisk tried this in 2006 with their anti-iPod campaign "iDon't" that
portrayed iPod owners as braying jackasses:
[http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/news/comments/sandisk-
launc...](http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/news/comments/sandisk-launches-
idont-anti-ipod-campaign/)

Sprint did something similar with the Palm Pre in 2009:
[http://jaysonelliot.com/blog/2009/06/27/the-wrong-way-to-
sel...](http://jaysonelliot.com/blog/2009/06/27/the-wrong-way-to-sell-me-a-
palm-pre/)

People want to think of themselves as smart, savvy consumers. When they buy a
big-ticket item, they spend time with the advertising AFTER they've already
bought it, as a way of reaffirming their choice. When I worked on the Land
Rover website from 2008-2010, we found that a significant amount of traffic
was from recent buyers. They were coming to the site to feel good about the
money they'd just spent.

Negative ads only work in political campaigns, where the goal is to suppress
your competitor's turnout.

If you want to beat the competition, focus on your own positives. You can
compare yourself to the competitor, but never tell their customers that
they're stupid. You might get sales from people that already dislike Apple,
but you'll never make a convert with an insult.

~~~
DilipJ
do you consider the "mac vs. pc" ads effective? Apple made the PC guy look
stuffy and naive (although I found him endearing).

~~~
jaysonelliot
The Mac vs. PC ads certainly polarized people. They seem to be very popular
among people who already own Macs, while PC owners tend to find them smug and
off-putting.

The ads seem to be more about attacking the competition than the competition's
customers, but they still come off as attack ads, sometimes rather nasty ones.

It's hard to say exactly how effective they were. Mac sales saw a boost during
that campaign, but other factors, such as the iPod "halo effect" and much-
publicized Windows Vista problems, could be credited as well. Who knows? Maybe
they would have sold more Macs with a more positive campaign.

I agree, though, John Hodgman was the more endearing of the two.

Maybe one way to judge the effectiveness of the ads is to look at the careers
of Justin Long and John Hodgman—it seems like "PC" came out on top, in their
case.

------
squealingrat
One of my favorite things about this ad (which I like for the most part)is the
'See more at facebook.com/samsungmobileUSA' Now there's something Apple would
never do. It's a generic, silly idea. I never want to go to a FB page to learn
about a product. How about an official website?

As a few previous bloggers have pointed out
([http://digithoughts.com/post/12962540298/apple-vs-samsung-
pi...](http://digithoughts.com/post/12962540298/apple-vs-samsung-pictures-
from-minimally-minimal)), Samsung needs to seriously simplify its message and
product line if it wants to compete.

~~~
freehunter
>I never want to go to a FB page to learn about a product.

How young/hip are you? There's a huge market on Facebook, and a huge market
that believes Facebook is the Internet. Facebook sells phones.

~~~
squealingrat
Hm. You must be one of those people who likes that Spotify forces new users to
use Facebook.

~~~
freehunter
You don't have to use or approve of a product to understand its business
model.

~~~
squealingrat
I just think it's a terrible idea to have a product's front page be a Facebook
page.

[EDITED for clarity]

