Buyer Behaviour and Samsung 2012 Ad Campaign - Case Study Example

Buyer Behaviour and Samsung Ad Campaign Introduction Samsung Ad Campaign (www.youtube.com) The following report examines and analyses the advertisement tactics used by Samsung to market its S3 phone. The Samsung Company makes efforts to market its S3 by comparing it with Apple’s iPhone five that is an updated version of iPhone 4. The two companies are currently not good friends, as the Apple Company did not take the slamming advertisement made by Samsung lightly. Samsung tried to portray the Apple Company as poor, non-creative and lacking innovations. Commercial advertisements at present have taken the centre of marketing and all the huge companies are daring to pay high prices to have their advertisements aired in the televisions, radios and newspaper (Akdeniz and Voorhees, 2013, pp. 11–14). Similarly, these companies are exploiting the free social media websites such YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and many others. The advertisement of S3 in this report in the social websites goes by the name “Samsung slams Apple Commercial –Galaxy S3." The advert is one among a series of many others that make up the Samsung advertisement campaign. Target audience The Samsung advertisement campaign focuses on the young people who are in colleges and leading a busy life. The commercial wants to capture the attention of the youth by their information that displays the S3 phone to be the most advanced in the market compared with the iPhone 5. The Samsung commercials portray the iPhone to belong to old people by informing us about the parents who send their son to book a place in line for them to purchase an iPhone. In this notion, Apple products are depicted to belong to the old people while the Samsung phones for the young generation. It is strongly supported by a young man revelation that he already bought S3 but was just booking a place for his friends. He also exclaims that he “moved on”, which when critically analysed depicts that the youths using iPhone are still hesitant. Another segment that the advertisement is targeting is the middle aged people. It is publicized by the use of young and middle aged people in the commercial. Notably, only two aged people are present in the advert. Accurate application of market segmentation method is evident in the commercial with the target of the youth implicating use of demographic segmentation (Surhone et al., 2010, pp. 100–102). This captures the youth’s attention promptly than if a different segment process had been used. The other business segments used are the lifestyle and geographical settings (McDonald and Dunbar, 2010, pp. 67–69). People who spend their time listening to music, watching video clips and sending emails are also the main targets of the advert (Hanafizadeh et al., 2012, pp. 11–112). Geographical setting that is the urban areas are painted by use of urban settings in the video clip. (www.youtube.com) Information details The advert creates awareness to the public about the features of the Samsung S3 phone by explaining that it is more advanced and more interactive with the human nature. The announcement offers information about the Samsung S3 phone. The manner in which the advertisement does this is by patronizing the Apple firm brand in order to raise their sales at the expense of another company’s loss. These have so far interfered with the relationship of these two companies. The benefits of the S3 phone are quite many as described in the advert (Ellis et al., 2011, pp. 51–54). Most prominent features are that the Samsung S3 phone has a bigger screen than the iPhone 5, they are 4.8 and 4.0 inches screen respectively. With the S3, it is easy to watch video while sending an email. It is also easy to share videos and songs using the S3 smartphone (Boivin et al., 2010, pp. 70–71). This is clearly defined by the advert where two guys are seen to demonstrate this utility by just bringing their phones into contact. The integration of such illustration and the words that are used to get the attention of the customer is well elaborated (Akdeniz and Voorhees, 2013, pp. 39–41). Just after the two guys complete sharing a playlist the others are shown to be mystified by this action. The response of one of the onlookers in the advert holds the customer’s attention by his question that suggests the phones transfer data by touching each other. The advert tries to explain that the iPhone five has 4G internet access only to trigger a quick response by one of the S3 users that they have been having that for a while now and nothing new in iPhone five contrary to what the Apple Company infers. The fact is that none of the two companies has real 4g internet, they all are fooling the customers so that to offer a broader view and not to appear inferior to each other (Rath et al., 2012, pp. 39–40). The S3 phone is portrayed to possess more advanced features than the iPhone five which is the new product in the business. The advert creates irony by showing that there is already that particular brand in the business and there is no need to reintroduce what is already in the business. One of the significant attributes of S3 phone is the integration of powerful processors in the phone. These processors make it fast and swift in all its applications including photo taking. The benefits of the S3 are, therefore, numerous and different compared to iPhone 5. The iPhone is mentioned to have a digital connector, but this is sarcastically explained to be worthless by the Samsung’s advert where a lady is heard asking what is meant by digital connectors. These are techniques to alter the viewer’s emotions and give the impression that S3 is by far better than iPhone 5 and they are not even comparable. The advert succeeds in showing that S3 is the smartest smartphone in the market by its awesome features and countless benefits. The use of demonstrations gives the viewer an impression of an excellent product in the market (Clow and Baack, 2012, pp. 29–33). In this way, the customer has a perception that Samsung is the best firm. Time of placement The advert was aired in 2012 when Apple Company was almost releasing its iPhone five to the market. The advertisements promptly led to the negative perception of the iPhone smartphone and increased knowledge about Samsung superiority in the business. This was an accurate time to get the attention of the public and get them informed about the benefits of the S3 smartphone. The advert was expected to have a quick response from the customers just as the commercial shown that people immediately changed their mind once they heard about the S3. It precisely indicated this effect by changing people’s mind from buying an iPhone five to enjoying the great features of the S3 (Berkowitz, 2011, pp. 19–25). The time conscious advert created a great impact in the emotions of people about the S3 smartphone. Place of advertisement The advert occurred at the streets of a busy town in Los Angeles and Chicago, where the participants were presumed to be queuing waiting to be served or purchasing iPhone 5. Ironically the product was already out of stock. The advertisement captured one of the guys saying that the Apple’s company should create special lines for those who queued most times. The advert concise image of unorganised and poor performing firm was exposed to all those who were watching the whole process of a long queue at the middle of the town as portrayed by the advert. To make matters worse, people are seen booking spots for their friends. A young man is depicted to have saved space for his parents who are coming to get an iPhone five too. Since these companies are competing in the market, the first one to get people’s attention attains higher market penetration than the other one. Samsung employed the obvious saying of hitting first and hitting harder, it is also reported having made a series of many other attacks in the business against the same Apple Firm and its non-innovative software. The location being at the middle of big cities and on a busy street is very significant in capturing the attention of the public (Kerin et al., 2011, pp. 11–15). Advertising channels The advertisement was aired in national TV stations as well as international TV stations such as Super Sport, BBC and CNN. Since Samsung is a multinational company, the advert was similarly aired in local TV and radio stations in various countries all over the world. The use of these traditional social media was a perfect decision to reach as many people as possible (Case et al., 2012, pp. 17–21). The advert was later uploaded in the modern social media websites like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Since the target was the young generation, recent social media websites served as supplementary means of getting youth’s attention and passing information. Advertisement intention The advert was meant purposely to dis the Apple Company. Additionally it also served the role of informing people the features of S3 and its superiority over the iPhone 5. The advert displayed not only how Apple Company is inferior technologically but also its inability to meet customer needs and wants (Chang, 2013, pp. 24–26). The concept is clear by the long waiting queues as well as demand overwhelming the supply. The advertisement correspondingly shows the ex post facto selling process practiced by the Apple business. Perception The video used in this particular ad is superb. It has characters that are coordinating what they are saying with the emotions they want to pass to the public. The texts used in these series of campaign are thought provoking and talking a thousand messages (Sarvary, 2012, pp. 09–15). The perception that Apple is for the older generation is brought about by the use of parents coming to buy the iPhone5. The visual emphasis is given to the image of the S3 smartphone and its attractive features. The benefits of the S3 are similarly overemphasized. Involvement of all the illustrative images makes the identity of S3 easier (Armstrong, 2011, pp. 43–44). After watching the advert, one can promptly identify the S3 in the market with much ease. No particular colours are used in this clip. The clip used text like “the next big thing is already here." This is meant to slam the iPhone five to be released three weeks later after the advert. Notably, this means that iPhone five has nothing special compared to S3 which is already in the market. Characters used are hilarious in the manner they behave and are used to elicit different emotions in people. Buyer process The ad is aimed at information searching stage of the buyer process (Ellis et al., 2011, pp. 38–39). The participants are getting to know the differences between S3 and iPhone five brands in the business so as to make informed choices before buying the products. The advert also presents the stage of alternative evaluations by identifying the particular features of the phone one wants. Involvement level The advert runs a high risk of being penalised for interfering with another company’s intellectual and patent rights (Ramesh, 2012, pp. 19–26). Samsung paid a fine of a billion dollars to Apple firm for the mocking advert. Another risk involved is the chances of making the iPhone five more famous than it was and in such an occurrence the advert will have served a negative purpose to the Samsung business. Marketing mix Product The featured product is the brand of the Samsung phones and their features. The features are brilliantly spoken and demonstrated in the advert. The comparison with the iPhone five phones makes these features more pronounced. Pricing The advert does not include the prices of the product, probably because price exclusion may prevent discouraging those who might not afford that cash at that time. Place The distribution strategies are not well illustrated in the advert, but a clue of faster selling process and enough product stock is evident from the Samsung’s advert. Promotion The promotion objectives of these series of adverts are building trust and pride of the Samsung products. The pride intentions can be perceived from the way the company compares itself with the others. Critique and recommendation The advert portrayed creativity and efforts to bring about the features of the smartphone. The most well done part of the advert is inclusion of the illustration scenes in the clip (Clow and Baack, 2012, pp. 53–54). The scenes attracted the attention of the viewer and brought awareness to the public about the differences between S3 and iPhone 5. The characters used too were perfect, marched their facial expression with the information being spoken (Mooradian et al., 2012, pp. 69–70). The advert emphasized greatly on the images and functionality of the phone being advertised. The information passed was accurate and straight to the point. The market segmentation method was clearly defined in the advert and the targeted group got the information without any contraindications. All the same I have issues with the mocking tendency of the Samsung campaigns. They should focus principally to the features and benefits of their brand and stop the comparison. The message can be perceived even better if they focused the attention to their own products (Ellis, 2011, pp. 81–82). The advert should also target a larger people and stop the perception that old people need Apple products instead of Samsung products. Similar advertisement Galaxy S4 advertisement (www.youtube.com) This brief report explains the advert for S4 galaxy smartphone from the Samsung Company. The advert is one among other series of ads from the Samsung Company (Samsung, 2013). Target audience The advert targeted youth generation and people whose lifestyle evolve around social media interaction. The market segmentation is evident from the manner in which the company launched and spread the S4 galaxy phone. The launching took place online via Facebook and twitter. The format used was to analyse and categorise the priorities of the countries presented online. Offer details The commercial just like the above discussed advert emphasizes on brand of smartphone from Samsung, the differences are that this particular one does less of the comparison and sticks more to the features of the S4 smart phone. Advertisement channel The channels used were the TV channels and the modern social media websites like Facebook and YouTube. Time of placement The advert took place in 2013 just before the launch of the of the S4 galaxy. The advertisement occurs both in the traditional and modern social websites pages as explained above. Mostly used in the S4 advertisement was the Twitter website since the company was interested in tracking the spread of information by monitoring the number of re-tweets. Advertisement intention The advert main purpose was to increase awareness to the public about the “next big thing in the business." The advert displayed fabulous features of the S4 galaxy in the clip with a brilliant explanation of the actions by a sound and audible background voice (Sarvary, 2012, pp. 114–116). Perception S4 galaxy advertisement is an excellent model of illustrating all the feasible emotions elicited by moving images. The use of S4 handset images evoked a feeling of reality and urges to possess such a phone. The images of people queuing online are just an accurate illustration of how fast the information will spread. Facilitating the information transfer is the need to represent one’s nation online. Buyer process The advert presents the information searching stage of the buyer process (Naudé, 2012, pp. 11–12). Risk involved The only risk involved is getting distorted data from online voting and comments since the percentage of people active on the internet does not represent a real people of the country. Market mix Product and price The product advertised is the S4 brand of Samsung Company. The advert never gave information on the price. Place and promotion The S4 advertised for the first time in February 2013 on Twitter, it later got to Facebook, BBC TV station from which it then spread to YouTube. The advert strengthens that the market segment targeted is the young people and technology-wise elite people. Conclusion and recommendation The advert was one of the best among the Samsung campaign series of advertisements. The significant thing about it is the excellent imagery technique used. Use of illustrative scenes captured the customer’s attention (Schmidt and Hollensen, 2010, pp. 75–76). Comparing this advert with the previous one there is none that is completely perfect but they complement each other. The first had many mocking scenes, but the second was straight to the point. Nonetheless, the second lacked interactive characters employed in the first advert. Both the adverts have slogans that facilitated emotions and feelings about the product (Kotler and Armstrong, 2012, p. 43-44). References Akdeniz, B., Calantone, Roger J, Voorhees, C.M., 2013. Effectiveness of Marketing Cues on Consumer Perceptions of Quality: The Moderating Roles of Brand Reputation and Third-Party Information. MAR Psychol. Mark. 30, 76–89. Armstrong, G., Kotler, Philip, 2011. Marketing: an introduction. Prentice Hall, Boston. Berkowitz, E.N., 2011. Essentials of health care marketing. Jones & Bartlett Learning, Sudbury, MA. 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