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Comment by mikecane | Hacker News Reader

When I saw the ad on TV, I thought it was egregiously self-congratulatory. It should have never escaped the WWDC. It's something to show in-house to rally the troops. Out in the world, it's just self-flattery and has a smug tone.

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I don't know if this applies or is true: but I once heard that soft (non-informative) car ads are run not to advertise their product, but to make people to recently bought or own that brand feel good about their decision.

Considering how many people own an Apple product, it's possible that the ads are just to make those people feel more loyal to the brand.

>I once heard that soft (non-informative) car ads are run not to advertise their product, but to make people to recently bought or own that brand feel good about their decision

Interesting concept, but couldn't you make ads that do both? I feel like the "Think small" ad [1] must have worked both for people who were looking to purchase a car at the time and those who'd already bought a Volkswagen.

[1] http://www.creativereview.co.uk/images/uploads/2013/07/think...

It did, it's one of the most successful ads in existence. The trick is that the headline and picture grabbed your attention, and then they sold nothing but facts about the product.

Ads for computers are often "soft" though, by nature of the fact that many of the buyers won't use hard facts to inform their decision as much as style, buzzwords, and brand imagery. These ads are building Apple's brand imagery which is that of the sort of brand who makes products for the cultivated sort who like high quality things with which they'll do "great things."

I think this is very much true considering Samsung's most (?) successful campaign lately has been focusing on the exact opposite message (Apple fanboys not knowing what's happening outside their world)

How was that campaign successful? It didn't move Apple a dent from the high end market.

But it sold lots of Samsung phones.

True. Always thought it was Apple that was targeted, but it was mostly a node to the Apple-haters crowd.

Non-informative ads are mainly used to create irrational desire. Enforcing brand loyalty is a side effect - less commonly the main goal - that comes easily, as the human mind loves being right and will actively look for evidence to support that view (seeking praise for products that it has bought).

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