Apple has always branded Mac as a Cool chap’s digital accessory and highlighted PC(indirectly Microsoft Windows) as an orthodox guy’s choice.
And the features of Mac outshine Windows in majority of the areas (especially in user experience). But Microsoft is still the OS Monopolist due to its deep roots and hardware independency.
The so-called Mac vs PC war started from day one of Mac’s launch and this always pushed Microsoft to produce better successor of Windows year after year.
The war is still on but…it’s less about better features,more usability,cheaper cost etc now but more about killer branding,viral marketing and a lot of Advertising.
Microsoft has went on to spend(rather burn) $300 Mn on an aggressive marketing campaign for Windows Vista. And most of you must have seen(if not,then see the first,second and third ad here) all the three Microsoft ads(all the three featuring Bill Gates himself) and the latest Mac commercial(targeting Microsoft).
One thing is crystal clear…...The fight has certainly changed
For MS & Apple,it’s more about outshining with ‘branding’ and ‘marketing’ rather than ‘technology’ now.
And in this regard,Microsoft is a looser but still a Winner
Why looser ?
Microsoft ads(the first two) were more of a puzzle than a convincing commercial.Although,the third one was much better than the earlier two but it couldn’t prove convincing enough for non-windows guys to think again.
Why Winner ?
One could easily observe that any of Microsoft ad(till now) hasn’t pointed fingers against Mac.They have spoken about MS,in a way praised about themselves but didn’t say anything wrong about Mac.
But when you watch the latest Mac commercial,whether you laugh or not but you will certainly realise that they are bitching more about Vista than talking good about their own product.This is ceratinly not expected from a respectable company like Apple(however they’ve been doing it earlier as well).
Here,Microsoft wins just because they have kept their ethics alive…
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Conclusion : Being ethically correct isn’t enough for MS.And the ads(and probably the entire marketing campaign) won’t do wonders for MS at all.Microsoft desperately needs a killer Windows version now to continue being the monopolist in OS industry.
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