There has been a lot of noise lately about the Palm Pre TV commercials from Palm. Well, someone had to defend them, right? Gary Koepke, co-founder and executive creative director at Modernista – the agency behind the ads – did just that.
The campaign features actress Tamara Hope speaking directly to the camera in near-robotic tones and sharing strange observations about traffic lights, jugglers, reincarnation and even about been crazy. Gary Koepke recently defended his work in an interview with AdAge.
We weren’t trying to creep people out, but one thing I have learned now in this digital age is people can be as rude as they want as long as they don’t have to look you in the face,” Mr. Koepke said. “The Pre is probably being talked about more than other phones right now because of the marketing and advertising, and that’s a good thing. Could the ads work harder to show exactly how the phone works? Yes, but we knew it would be polarizing people to have a woman not shout at them and tell an interesting story.
In that sense, the advertising campaign has been successful. It’s gotten people talking. Modernista is aiming for “human”, but many people think that they just missed the mark.
Here’s what Mr. Koepke said, comparing the humanized feel of the Palm Pre ads to its competitors.
It’s a very different look and feel for this sector. There’s nobody involved in an iPhone ad, and ‘Your life is on BlackBerry’ — isn’t that great? Instead of having a life? We wanted a middle ground between those two places — what about the people who want a really great smartphone?
AdAge also notes that the Palm Pre will be in an exclusive sponsorship of “Bollywood Hero”, a three-part musical miniseries premiering on IFC Aug. 6, starring “Saturday Night Live” vets Chris Kattan and Maya Rudoloph, as well as Keanu Reeves. Modernista and IFC co-created a miniseries for Palm, “A La Kattan,” featuring the actor using his Pre to help him out of different scenarios.
Also coming up, on Aug. 9, Palm will debut “Peter Mehlman’s Narrow World of Sports,” a series of webisodes on YouTube and other Google properties.
[Via AdAge]
