Microsoft takes Vista advertising to YouTube
If you've been wondering where all the advertising for Windows Vista has disappeared to, look no further YouTube. Starting from last week, Microsoft has begun uploading a series of original short videos showcasing a combination of Windows Vista, Windows Live and Office 2007 experiences.
Context & Ripple Effects
Microsoft ends a rough first year for Vista with a channel shift: after a February debut the New York Times found short on 'wow' and an autumn in which the Vista wow became a whisper, the company is now uploading original short videos pitching Windows Vista alongside Windows Live and Office 2007 directly to YouTube. It follows November's 'Don't Give Up on Vista' web ad in treating the web, not broadcast, as the place to rescue the product's image.
The move has two ironies worth flagging. TechCrunch notes Microsoft is leaving comments open — handing YouTube's audience an unfiltered verdict on a product whose reception has been the story all year. And it comes days after Microsoft petitioned the European Union against Google's DoubleClick acquisition, meaning the company is advertising on Google-owned inventory while trying to block Google from getting bigger in exactly that market.
First-order effects
- Microsoft gets Vista, Windows Live and Office 2007 messaging in front of YouTube's audience at near-zero media cost, but with comments left open every upload doubles as a live focus group on Vista's reputation.
- The campaign puts Microsoft money into Google's video platform even as Microsoft lobbies the EU to block the DoubleClick deal — an advertiser relationship sitting awkwardly beside an antitrust fight.
Second-order effects
- Rival consumer-software marketers — most visibly Apple, whose attack ads set the tone for Vista's year — face a competitor no longer ceding the online-video channel, and one inviting comparison in public comments.
- A marketer of Microsoft's scale validating YouTube as a brand-advertising venue pressures other large advertisers still treating the site as experimental, tightening Google's pricing power over video inventory.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, flagship product launches migrate from broadcast buys to social video platforms where the audience response is part of the creative — making comment sentiment a metric brands can't fully control.
- It sketches the structural bind of 2007-era digital advertising: even companies litigating against a platform's owner end up funding it, because reach concentrates faster than antitrust moves.
The trend: Consumer software marketing is shifting from television campaigns to social video platforms, where open comment sections turn advertising into a public referendum on the product.