With Broken Promises, Apple focuses on the core Windows customer concern - reliability
“Trust Me” Means They’re Telling the Truth this Time
The latest Macintosh vs. PC commercial on television, Broken Promises, is rapidly winning me over as the PC guy comes out to say that his newest Windows 7 is really reliable and has fixed the major glitches with that infamous line, “trust me.” Then Mac asks him, didn’t I hear you say that before? The writers of this soft sell TV commercial then leads us back through the past few decades of Windows editions, each time PC claims to have fixed the problems, “trust me.”
Like a Battered Spouse, I Keep Believing their Promises not to Abuse Me Any More
Watching this commercial made me realize that my love for the Windows operating system, which goes back to 1992 when I first used Windows 3.1, is much like the battered spouse syndrome. I’m not being flip here and devaluing the pain that spouses go through. Please give me a moment to see my point, because abuse can be emotional too. And there can be different degrees of it.
Over the decades Microsoft has used promises and glib statements to promote their next version of Windows, the latest and greatest with features you can’t live without as well as fixes to the overwhelming problems of the last version. With some trepidation, I would eventually upgrade. Some of these versions were infuriatingly frustrating, like Windows ME which had no easy backup capability, or the version, I forget which, that was unable to restore a backup from the prior version. I want to avoid a tirade against Microsoft here. I merely want to support my point that this and many other actions they’ve taken in their haste to dominate the market has left long-time Windows users battered and bruised.
Soft Sell Marketers Focus on their Customers and Deliver on Promises
I like best the point
Judith & Jim make about the difference between hard sell and soft sell. Hard sell salespeople and marketers will do whatever it takes to get your money. If they must pay attention to benefits to make the sale, they will, but the attention is not on their customers first, only as a means to their end. Soft sell salespeople and marketers also want to make sales. However, they put the interests, needs and concerns about their customers first. They speak to the heart of their customers problems and needs –
and they deliver the goods as promised.
Mac Reminded Me of the Pain from Broken Promises, the Choice to Move on Is Mine
So Apple’s latest Macintosh vs. PC commercial on television is soft sell because there’s no hurry, no push to act now, and, most of all, it focuses on prospects’ concerns. Apple reminds us of the pain and broken promises. When I’m ready to invest in a new computer, I’ll be looking seriously, for the first time, at Macintosh because Apple speaks to my concerns – not speed, not graphics, not storage – but reliability and trust. Getting a long time PC users to consider dumping years of investment in software so as to make a change means Mac’s soft sell TV commercial has major impact.
Do you agree? I invite you to add your opinion in the Comments below.
