Hasta La Creative!

Entre as iniciativas programadas para marcar o lançamento do Windows 7, estava o patrocínio de um especial de 1 hora de “Family Guy”. Sem intervalos comerciais, apenas com “um oferecimento” do novo sistema operacional, o episódio da série animada estaria no prime time da Fox. Só que a Microsoft pipocou.

Após assistir uma prévia do especial em questão, a gigante de Redmond desistiu do acordo com Seth MacFarlane, criador de “Family Guy”, e com a Fox.

O motivo é simples: conteúdo não adequado ao objetivo da marca Windows. Entre conteúdo não adequado, leia: piadas com deficientes auditivos, Holocauso, higiene feminina e incesto.

O executivo de marketing e chefe de branded entertainment da Microsoft, Gayle Troberman, chegou a dizer que os espectadores veriam a marca profundamente integrada ao conteúdo, e que “Family Guy” mostaria como o Windows 7 é capaz de simplificar o PC, sendo rápido e fácil e usar.

A Microsoft diz que ainda mantem boas relações com McFarlane e Fox, e que pretende trabalhar em conjunto com ambos no futuro (os promos no site win741.com continuam). Já a Fox, disse que manterá a exibição do especial, intitulado “Family Guy Presents: Seth & Alex’s Almost Live Comedy Show,” para o dia 8 de novembro.

Eu só tento entender se, os executivos da Microsoft que aprovaram a ação, já tinham assistido algum episódio de “Family Guy” antes. É óbvio que devem escolher parcerias que tenham afinidade com a marca, mas voltar atrás só da mais munição para a Apple colocar um coxinha engravatado nos comerciais dizendo: “Eu sou um PC.”

| Via AdAge

Post originalmente publicado no Brainstorm #9
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A Microsoft estreou ontem o primeiro comercial para o seu Windows Phone, concorrente direto do iPhone e Android

Tecnicamente, o Windows Phone é a nova versão do sistema operacional Windows Mobile, a 6.5, só que agora dando nome também ao hardware. A campanha para o gadget inclui comercial de TV, mídia impressa e exterior, com foco nas aplicações tradicionais que as pessoas já utilizam no desktop, mas que podem ser levadas também no bolso.

Segundo pesquisas da Microsoft, menos de 10% dos usuários de PC sabem que podem ter os mesmos softwares também no celular. O Windows Phone conta com apenas 60 aplicativos, contra os mais de 85 mil disponíveis para iPhone, porém, como você vai ver no comercial abaixo, a empresa de Redmond conta com a fama e grande base de usuários dos pacotes Office, MSN, etc.

Atente para o “Twitter” entrando no porta-malas…

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Microsoft is breaking out the big guns on CW’s Vampire Diaries tonight to promote Windows 7 OS, which will involve an adorable little girl and fuzzy baby animals. The software giant is capitalizing on the success of the spots it ran earlier this year featuring Kylie, the precocious preschooler. This time, Kylie makes her very own slide show, featuring pictures of animals along with reviews of the new operating system from magazines and bloggers. “More happy is coming,” Kylie promises, as the screen flashes the October release date.

I love all of this cuteness and optimism, but what has me scratching my head is the campaign’s strategy. Why would Microsoft launch this spot on a minor network on a night that’s been referred to as the “primetime graveyard,” as opposed to launching it during, say, Monday Night Football, when it has an audience with actual buying power? Stay tuned.

Sara Barton is a copywriter, social media strategist, and avid blogger who is in search of her next opportunity. Contact her via Twitter, LinkedIn, or her blog.

It’s out there and everyone’s talking about it. It’s been proven to give companies an edge on competition and the ability to form a bond with customers. So why aren’t you involved in social media yet?

As a freelancer in social media, I’ve noticed that there are numerous corporations that are still not involved with Twitter, Facebook, or anything on the Internet beyond a website and an email. This is, in essence, what it would be like when everyone started to advertise on the television when it was first invented and a company simply ignored it and kept to the “old school” ways of handing out fliers to people. Although it is important to respect the more traditional ways of advertising, you must also incorporate the new to properly promote and advertise your company and brand (my fellow Beneath the Brand blogger Jon Leung agrees – check out his post Marketers’ Dilemma: Facebook or Twitter).

The best thing about social media – it’s easy and free. At the moment, I recommend starting with Twitter because, as I’m sure you’ve heard, it’s becoming more and more similar to the dot com boom (i.e. don’t be the last one to figure it out).

Look at Twitter this way: imagine all your customers coming together on a daily basis and talking about topics that pertain to you and your company, thereby spreading even more information about your company and gaining more recognition and consumers.

Let me use a company as an example that I am currently involved with: Dolphin Blue, Inc. Dolphin Blue helps businesses go green through its office supplies. If you thinking of promotion from a networking standpoint, the first thing you would do is to find a group that matches your interests, in this case, any green groups that deals with the ecosystem or world health. You would then attend the group sessions, meet people who have those same interests, and start conversations with them about your company. Twitter is exactly like this, only on a much larger scale.

After creating a Twitter account, log on to www.search.twitter.com and search (#green) for people talking about green issues. “Follow” them, re-tweet things they’ve tweeted that you agree with and *poof,* people will start following you, re-tweeting things you’ve posted, and, most importantly, become aware of your services. And thus, networking and building your business starts on a national level. The more people you meet, the more people who talk about you and your company.

Within four hours of Dolphin Blue publishing its Twitter account, it had six mentions and 26 followers! On day two, those numbers grew to 14 mentions and 93 followers. Imagine how many more people it’ll reach within the next week, month or year.

I think Griffin Farley of 22squared said it best. “Don’t plan for the ones you reach, plan for the ones they reach.” It’s all about who you know, right?

Megan Green is a freelance propagation planner who has had her work published on PR News Wire, as well as many other outlets. Contact her on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, or at megankategreen@gmail.com.

Microsoft launched two “Hulu-esque” online TV spots this week that star Dean Cain, the actor known as Superman from the TV series “Lois & Clark.” The spots are a bit surreal, much like the Hulu commercials that have were released earlier this year. The two spots, named F.O.M.S. (Fear Of Missing Something) and S.H.Y.N.E.S.S. (Sharing Heavily Yet Not Enough Sharing Still), are in support of Internet Explorer 8 (IE8), released in its final version on March 19th of 2009.

It’s unclear if Microsoft is experiencing low download rates for IE8, or are simply running the spots to support the new software in a more competitive environment. The IE8 browser is chock-full-o-features that include new malware protection, a discrete browsing mode (for those that need to hide their searches) and greater tab control. One of the best features is that when the browser crashes, it only restarts that particular tab, leaving the rest of the tabs operating normally. However, there are problems with IE8, such as it has to run in “compatibility mode” to read a majority of websites, and it is not as fast as the sparsely-featured Google Chrome browser.

The ads do nothing to dispel these irregularities, and instead are somewhat humorous takes on personal browsing habits. Both of the spots are featured on YouTube, as well as below. F.O.M.S features a woman frantic over missing a bid on EBay, while S.H.Y.N.E.S.S. enables people that send crap over the internet to send it faster using one of IE8’s accelerators. (great…)

The campaign, if it can be called such, is masquerading as a set of PSAs that are promoting BrowserfortheBetter.com, which is a landing page devoted to the new browsers. What’s great about downloading IE8 from this page is that for every download, Microsoft will donate eight meals to Feeding America, the nation’s leading domestic hunger-relief charity.

Whether a humanitarian effort or a sales ploy to get the browsers downloaded, the result is the same: food for the hungry. And for this, Microsoft deserves recognition.

Jeff Louis: Strategic Media Planner, Project Manager, and New Business Coordinator. His passion is writing, contributing to BMA as well as freelancing. He’d love to hear from you, so leave a comment or follow the links:linkedin.com or twitter.com.

Bing was on last night, and no, it’s not Bing Crosby.

Microsoft, tired of watching Google cash in on the search engine game, has been testing their super secret search engine for some months now under the ultra-secret name, Kumo. (It is hard to believe that these people make money, isn’t it?) Along with the huge product release comes the equally huge budget, rumored to be upwards of $80 Million, although Microsoft would not confirm.

“We’ll have what I would call a big budget — big enough that I had to gulp when I approved the budget,” said Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer, who unveiled Bing at a technology conference in Carlsbad, California, run by the All Things Digital tech blog.

The spot, code named “Manifesto,” was on prime time television last night. While the visuals are sometimes a bit confusing, the Google-gauging “one-liners,” such as “we don’t need queries and keywords if the bring back questions and confusion,” and “from this moment on, the search overload is officially, over” are loud and clear.

The creative kudos go to JWT for coming up with a very cool spot. However, it is not known if they came up with the name, and as everybody knows, part of winning the online new product introduction game is coming up with a goofy, yet memorable name. Such as “Bing.” Your search is done.

Jeff Louis: Strategic Media Planner, Project Manager, and New Business Account Coordinator. His passion is writing. If you would like to get in touch with Jeff, please leave a reply or follow the links: www.linkedin.com or www.twitter.com.

Are you a PC?
Not are you PC, but are you a PC? IE, do you use a PC rather than an Apple? We’ve all been witness to the battle played out over TV, online, and in print…Microsoft vs. Apple, Apple vs. Microsoft. This is no David and Goliath altercation, but the two biggest bullies meeting on the corner to pound the crap out of one another. Yet, deep inside, they realize that they need one another…with most of Apple’s apps available on a PC, and Microsofts’ apps available on Apple, it’s a struggle for dominance where each concedes that the other has some really good qualities.

It’s a wonder they haven’t come together to capitalize on the other’s strengths rather than working to pulverize one another. Some of the strongest unions have been birthed by radically opposing forces: The US and Japan, Tom and Jerry, India and Pakistan, etc.

Microsoft’s newest entry into the foray is comprised of numerous spots, varying in length, of people that are claiming to be “a PC.” Some are cute, some informational, and the others are a bit boring. One of the better ones is Laptop Hunters (seen below).

<a href="http://video.msn.com/?mkt=en-US&#038;playlist=videoByUuids:uuids:0bb6a07c-c829-4562-8375-49e6693810c7&#038;showPlaylist=true&#038;from=msnvideo" title="Laptop Hunters $1000 – Lauren Gets an HP Pavilion">Video: Laptop Hunters $1000 – Lauren Gets an HP Pavilion</a>

Whether you are Mac or PC doesn’t matter to anyone but you, and the company from which you purchased your computer. So be it. But, why can’t we all just get along?

Mais um lançamento da Gringo hoje, dessa vez para o Windows Live da Microsoft. “Quem?!!!” é um teste virtual bem-humorado que mostra quais ferramentas do Windows Live combinam com o seu estilo.

São 16 personagens diferentes, cada um apresentando uma das características da plataforma, como Messenger, Hotmail, Spaces, Galeria de Fotos, etc. É produto martelando na tela o tempo todo, mas mostrados de maneira divertida.

O site foi desenvolvido através de Silverlight, também conhecido como “o Flash” da Microsoft.

This is bound to be a wake up call for people who believe that Microsoft is the last company to be hit by the economic turmoil befalling us today. It has been announced that Bill Gates and company will be laying off a large chunk of their staff in various regions by 15,000 workers in light of the hard times we are in.

Now this may be a cause for alarm for most people today. Who would ever thought that Microsoft would join the fray of cutting cost by releasing most of their employees today.

According to Fudzilla, web chitter chatter to this affect is now “no longer a rumour but a fact” and it would see Microsoft’s 90,000 global workforce trimmed by approximately 15,000 jobs come 15 January. As to which countries or departments will be hit worst that remains up in the air but it is said EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) and MSN could be hit hardest by the redundancies.

The economic problem is getting worse folks. Let us try to keep our heads in check and start thinking of ways to survive!

(Source) Fudzilla

If you thought that the failed talks between the potential merger between Yahoo and Microsoft are over then guess again. Apparently while the last meeting did not turn out well, it seems that Microsoft is planning to make an alternative offer to possibly make the merger push through.

Google has long been dominating the online advertising binge and apparently Microsoft knows it can give Google some form of competition with this merger from Yahoo. There are discussions going on at the moment but though they may not show anything potent at this point, you can just imagine how determined Microsoft Corp. is as far as balancing competition for a larger share of the market saturation for online advertising today.

Microsoft Corp. is once again trying to team up with Yahoo Inc. to challenge Internet search and advertising leader Google Inc., although at this point the renewed talks haven’t escalated to another attempt to take over Yahoo.

The Redmond, Wash.-based software maker disclosed the revived discussions Sunday without providing any specifics about the nature of the deal being explored except to say it involved bolstering the companies’ position in the online search and advertising markets.

“There of course can be no assurance that any transaction will result from these discussions,” the statement said.

(Source) Associated Press

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