Linked List: April 5, 2009

Sunday, 5 April 2009

Unicorn Tears, Eh? 

Newsweek’s Dan Lyons talks to David Webster, general manager for brand marketing at Microsoft, regarding Microsoft’s new ad campaign for Windows:

He says the idea was to turn Apple’s “I’m a Mac” campaign to Microsoft’s advantage. “We associate real people with being PCs, [but then Apple] ends up looking pretty mean-spirited, the way they go after customers,” he says. “It’s clear that’s who they are insulting.” At the same time he can’t resist taking a crack at the preciousness of some Mac users. “Not everyone wants a machine that’s been washed with unicorn tears,” he says.

It seems clear that Microsoft’s stance on the Mac’s sales growth is that there’s nothing wrong with Windows or right with the Mac, but rather that there’s something wrong with Mac users.

Reminds me of the attitude of U.S. carmakers in the ’70s and ’80s, as more Americans switched to Japanese imports.

Matt Haughey on How Social Media Really Works 

Exactly right:

So maybe instead of getting your company on twitter, paying marketers to mention you are on twitter, and paying people to blog about your company, forget all that and just make awesome stuff that gets people excited about your products, hire people that represent the company well, and when your stuff is so awesome that friends share it with other friends, you may not even need “social media marketing” after all.