

Robots vs People: Or why Android device marketing is just weird. - feverishaaron
http://www.netwhisperer.com/2010/08/25/android-marketing/

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cscotta
It really is a shame that so much of the Android marketing has taken its cue
from Verizon's techno-masculine Droid branding.

Google was dead on with the Nexus One's "Web Meets Phone" ad. If you haven't
seen it, it's worth watching - right at the center of Google's brief
expressive / cute / minimalist advertising phase. Think back to the "Parisian
Love" Super Bowl ad and the Motion Theory "Google Chrome" short. They're
delightful.

These shorts present Google as a very different company - one that's personal,
bright, and helpful. Much of this work is coming from (or commissioned by) a
division called Creative Lab that's largely independent from the majority of
Google's culture and management structure. I had the pleasure of collaborating
with them on a couple projects and was amazed by their creativity, insight,
and lighthearted approach.

I would love to see more work in this style from Google. They've demonstrated
they're perfectly capable of creating very good ads that deliver a
consistently solid impression, but have ceded much of the opportunity to brand
Android to carriers who have screwed it up to the nines (though we shouldn't
forget that the platform is actually called "Android"), with the lone
exception of HTC's highly personal commercials.

I hope they can turn it around. If and when they do, I further hope that it
will be a part of a more comprehensive strategy to rebrand Android as a whole.
It's a solid platform with a lamentably robotic image.

\---

[1] Nexus One ad: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6COwgigJ-g>

[2] Parisian Love: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnsSUqgkDwU>

[3] Motion Theory's "Chrome": <http://vimeo.com/5721933>

~~~
gbhn
I don't know much about advertising, but could this be on purpose? That is, an
attempt to create the impression in the market that the Droid is the powerful,
bold, masculine device, and so by implication (certainly never stated
directly) that the iPhone is the rounded, feminine device. I don't have a
marketer's sense about why that'd be an agenda item, but I could guess it may
be a tried-and-true PR advertising technique -- if you're coming from behind,
try to create an identity issue around the decision that will get you the
fraction of the market you think you can get.

I think if you try, you can see analogues to this strategy in Apple's
marketing, especially when it was famously coming from behind in the "I'm a
Mac" ads. By attempting to segment the market -- "If you're a serious older
person, PCs are for you, but if you're a young hipster, the Mac is your
natural choice." -- they attempted to artificially create this sort of
identity-based split in preference.

Again, I'm not a marketer, so I don't know if this is standard playbook or
just reading more into what I see. I don't even know if this stuff works, but
based on Apple fans' statements, it seems to me the message that they should
think of themselves as a young, hip, enlightened minority who "just get it"
and have great fashion sense seems to have taken root pretty well.

~~~
megablast
Doesn't seem to be hurting Google to much, with over 200,000 devices activated
per day, if the CEO is to be believed.

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mattmaroon
He's obviously never sold PCs to regular people. They care about features as
much as techies, maybe more. I did this in the late 90s. People were asking
how much RAM a computer had, how many megahertz the processors were, etc. who
didn't have the slightest clue what they meant.

The laundry list of tech specs works even on people who don't have the
slightest clue what they mean.

~~~
sqrt17
Yes... the "geeks/techies" he talks about are the normal people. As opposed to
the "if its purpose is something I want, and it's expensive enough, it can't
really suck" crowd that Apple is able to tap into.

The second group of people would have significant reservations to buy a
copycat design if they can afford the original. The first group is concerned
about _bang for the buck_. And they only know how to measure "bang" in terms
of numbers - because, among nondescript gray boxes (or small packets of shiny
black) that all run similar software, those numbers are all you can easily
find out.

Care to see how good the camera is? Either take a standardized benchmark to
try out in controlled lighting conditions, or ask for the numbers. Do you want
to know how well the microphone does? Either take your oscilloscope with you,
have very good hearing, or ... well, people are not eagerly asking for
numbers, they just assume that the microphone is always good enough for
talking and not good enough for serious music recording.

Apple can work towards their targeted pricepoint by selecting which
features/experiences to include such that the product as a whole is a pleasant
experience. (Even though, among the "experience" crowd, no one would go for
the quality of earphones that the iPod comes with, if they were to shop for
new ones). The "commodity" people have a given feature set (the industry
standard) and a pricepoint (or even worse, compete based on price) and all
they can do to preserve their margins is squeeze hard.

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jemfinch
While his point may contain some truth, his examples biased: it's unfair to
compare 30-60s brand advertising for Android to what's effectively an 8m
infomercial for the iPad.

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scotty79
> “There is no wrong way to hold it” As opposed to some other Apple products.

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regularfry
6-word summary:

    
    
        Android sells *what*. Apple sells *why*.

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danilocampos
It's a puzzling approach. Are they hoping early adopters/influencers on the
hardcore geek end of the curve convince the less tech savvy in the middle?

I don't buy it as a good strategy, if that's what they're after. Android, from
a UX perspective, is an odd mix of feature phone and high-end ATM. (I mean,
really, it's like a Bank of America cash machine and my old RAZR had a child
together.)

It's not immediately apparent how to get around, at times, and the mystery
meat behavior of the hardware back button is often baffling.

The iPhone, of course, was first a hit among nerds before it exploded into the
wider market. The big reason for that was that the phone was just genuinely
better than what most people were carrying in their pockets. So while techies
influenced adoption, they were only channels for that influence, not
influencers themselves.

The real influencer, of course, was a focused, enjoyable UX.

Android still has catching up to do; it's far more likely to leave a toe-in-
the-water user cold than inspire buying behavior.

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lotusleaf1987
Different marketing for different audiences. I don't think the Droid is going
to be sold much as an enterprise device, so why advertise to those users?
Apple advertising is almost always androgynous, agnostic, and basically smooth
and clean. I think mainly Apple wants the user to decide how to define the
product, not predefine it and then hope to attract users who fit into that
category.

