Sprint “Dreams” Spot is Good
I know we do some pretty good avertising at Apple, but I think we could do better (and rotate it more frequently). Sprint did better. Tip of the hat to them for it.
The only gripe, I suppose, is that they are not advertising anything new, per se. They are saying “we have a fast network, and so we can do more.” (Than, say, AT&T: Their website for the campaign features a comparison of network speeds with AT&T.) There is an obvious elephant in the room that is causing all the other cell companies to aggressively advertise, particularly against AT&T, and I hope to see some good competition. Everybody wins in the end that way. And hey, I like a good ad now and then.
It has an interesting behind the scenes video too.
July 17th, 2007 at 12:52 am
Sprint has poster versions of these ads that have to do with SMS that were /all over/ all of the airports I’ve been through in the past two weeks.
July 17th, 2007 at 12:55 am
Also, I’m not sure Sprint’s ad is really better than the iPhone ads. I know that everyone has been completely submerged in those iPhone ads by now, but they’re still incredibly distinctive ads that illustrate the function of the device better than any spoken or text description could.
The Sprint ads are are pretty unique and eye-catching in their own way too–I just feel the iPhone ads are better actual product/service ads.
July 17th, 2007 at 1:06 am
Yeah, I agree that the iPhone ads are great at marketing a product. And perhaps they are subtly marketing the idea — ease of interaction. Sprint’s ads are doing something that is also interesting, which is marketing the general idea of better, and of what you can do with better. Ultimately they will have a tough time trying to just be “better” instead of “different”, and so the ad production quality will surpass the product delivery quality. But I don’t hold that against the ad - in this blog post I am praising the ad in and of itself.
July 17th, 2007 at 9:09 am
Well, I didn’t touch on whether or not the iPhone delivers what the ads promise–just that the iPhone ads are illustrative of the function of the device–and that’s what is needed to sell it.
Ultimately all ads exist to try to sell you something. With complete disregard for whether or not Sprint is actually delivering what their ad claims, their ad still is not illustrating and selling the product/service as well as the iPhone’s ads are.
I think Sprint’s ad is a great ad in the abstract artsy sense of what makes an ad great, but it is not a great ad when you mix in a dash of practicality as to what it should be doing.
July 17th, 2007 at 5:25 pm
Indeed, while they are selling an idea better than we are. Like, we leave the intelligent viewer to make the connection of seamlessness, but the contrivance and plainness of some of our examples in the commercials make it seem bland. Granted, it is always best to underpromise and overdeliver.
Ultimately I put this in the same place that I put the Sony Bravia ads from a few years ago…. really neat. The neatest thing for me with this one is that we had the technology to make an ad like that for a long time, and somebody only now realized to do it. Granted the editing would have been a bitch back then…
July 18th, 2007 at 9:40 am
Thinking about it a bit more, I see your point. I guess I was too focused on the iPhone–I think the iPhone ads worked well for selling the iPhone, as I said, and I wouldn’t have wanted Apple to put out something that focused less on that product.
But in the grander scheme of things, though, I do wish Apple+chiat/day would do more abstract ads like this Sprint one and the Sony Bravia, which don’t really focus on selling any particular thing. It’d be nice to see something a bit more abstract than the Switcher ads or Get a Mac ads. Obviously Apple needs simple, to-the-point ads like those, but it’d be fun to mix it up with some abstract stuff from time to time.