Re: Laptop Hunter ads

ZnU wrote:
So, a couple of days ago, several of the Apple-bashers were in here repeating a story told by Microsoft COO Kevin Turner:

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And so we've been running these PC value ads. Just giving people saying, hey, what are you looking to spend? ³Oh, I'm looking to spend less than $1,000.² Well we'll give you $1,000. Go in and look and see what you can buy. And they come out and they just show them. Those are completely unscripted commercials.

And you know why I know they're working? Because two weeks ago we got a call from the Apple legal department saying, hey -- this is a true story -- saying, "Hey, you need to stop running those ads, we lowered our prices." They took like $100 off or something. It was the greatest single phone call in the history that I've ever taken in business.

I did cartwheels down the hallway. At first I said, "Is this a joke? Who are you?" Not understanding what an opportunity. And so we're just going to keep running them and running them and running them.
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This sounded pretty fishy to me, as I noted in http://groups.google.com/group/comp.sys.mac.advocacy/msg/6de86cc94b1374cc
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I'm sure that's just a completely accurate account. Of course Apple legal called and said "Hey, you need to stop running those ads, we lowered our prices." Because that's totally how the legal department of a Fortune 500 company deals with the COO of another Fortune 500 company.

Now, if you told me that Apple's legal department had contacted Microsoft with specific objections about how the ads were misleading, I might believe that. Because they are. I rather suspect something like that is precisely what happened, and this Turner guy is paraphrasing a little too liberally (i.e. basically making stuff up).
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So today, it turns out that: http://www.macrumors.com/2009/07/24/microsoft-alters-laptop-hunters-ads-i
n-wake-of-apple-price-cuts/
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Advertising Age reports that Microsoft has quietly altered at least one of its "Laptop Hunters" television commercials to remove reference to the price of a MacBook Pro after recent price cuts to Apple's notebook line rendered the reference inaccurate.
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In other words, Turner's public gloating was, in fact, pretty much nonsense. Apple had, as I suspected, contacted Microsoft with a specific objection (to a now-inaccurate line about the price of a MacBook Pro, as it turns out).


That's all well and good but the FACT is that the Mac will cost a lot more than the PC laptop for what you get. All MS or whoever would need to do is place an add saying that Macs cost more rather than they cost a specific price.

John
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