On May 2nd, 2006 Apple launched their first Get A MAC Commercial. This campaign was created by the advertising agency TBWA, CHIAT and Day. In the first year the campaign produced 19 advertisements. After 4 years the campaign decided to include "MAC", which was played bye Justin Long and "PC"played by John Hodgman. Each actor was made to look like the computers they represent along with their creators. Actor Justin Long beared a resemblance to steve Jobs while John Hodgman was dressed to look like Bill Gates.
Apple wanted to make "MAC" look superior by convincing the customers that their product was better. They showcased "MAC" as a better computer and overall a nicer guy and displayed a sense of caring, humility and overall cool and energetic vibe. While "PC" was being arrogant, slow, boring, mean, unreasonable, and most importantly a nerd. One of the main strategies that Apple used in this campaign was the theme of simplicity. The backdrop of these advertisements are plain white with nothing else to distract the eye. The company is subtly making the viewer aware of how simple and better their product is to use and how simple it is to switch from PC to MAC.Also, highlighting a specific problem that PC had, this was able to make the audience question if a PC was the right type of a computer to have.
Overall, the strategies Apple used were able to capture the audience and keep them attentive and interested throughout the whole campaign. Only after a few commercials of the campaign sales dramatically increased by 12% in the first quarter of the campaign. In the last quarter of 2006 after more commercials came out, Apple sold a record breaking 1,600,000 Macs, an increase of 39%. In the last quarter Apple sold over 2,300,000 MACS. Sales continued to dramatically increase throughout the entire four year campaign.
In my opinion, “Get a Mac” campaign turned out to be a huge success for Apple. Although they were humorous commercials, it effectively showed all viewers that Apple is the better product in a way that everyone could understand. They managed to make MAC’s look like the hip new product that everyone’s buying and they managed to make PCs look like the outdated product with many problems that Macs don’t have. This campaign boosted sales for Apple to a level they have never reached before and it convinced many PC users to switch to a MAC. Although it did receive some criticism from some people for “attacking” PCs, the campaign received proved to be extremely effective in reaching its target audience and is considered one of the best advertising campaigns of this decade.
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