No, I was not at all planning to write about the new boAt campaign that everyone seems to be sure that they must have an opinion about 🙂
But, after seeing enough butthurt fanboys tear the campaign down, it probably deserves some perspective.
For context, I’m not an Apple ‘fanboy’. I got my first-ever iPhone (in life!) early in March 2024, after having been on Android phones for over 11 years. I wrote about why I moved, and my initial reactions as well.
Besides this, I have been on MacBooks (Air/Pro) for a very long time. I do admire Apple as a company, but I do not believe many of their products are ‘value for money’ for me, personally. My purchases of Apple products (only laptops and now, phone) have come after a very long research phase. The same research led me not to buy other products from Apple, like the earbuds or the watch, and I am perfectly content with far cheaper, but aptly functional alternatives from say OnePlus and Fitbit. While I say this, I do understand why people prefer Apple products even at such (relatively) astronomical prices. I believe Apple products age well (MacBooks are a case in point; it’s too early for me tell the same about iPhone) while I don’t think I can confidently say the same about either Android-based phones or Windows-based laptops. But I have not bought the premium/top-end Android phones or Windows laptops (that compete in price with the iPhones and MacBooks) to conclude rationally. I have always invested in mid-segment Android phones and Windows laptops, so the comparison (about ‘ageing well’) may not be accurate.
Having set this context, let me start with the perspective that the boAt (it hurts me physically to see the capital A in between, and even more so, when I have to type it!) campaign is not targeting Apple at all.
Yes, there are some feature-based claims (better bass, better active noise cancellation, and better battery life) in the print ad. but these are hardly the reason why someone would choose, or not choose, Apple earpods. In fact, even a hardcore Apple fanboy could try a new pair of boAt Airdopes Supreme, each, every month for one full year for the price of a new pair of the 3rd Generation Apple earpods.
That’s the key here, in boAt’s campaign. boAt absolutely knows that its products and Apple’s products do not compete at all. They belong to vastly different worlds, and both are perfectly valid worlds that are adequately useful to those respective buyer segments.
And yet, knowing all this, if boAt still seemingly fired a salvo (if we can it that at all) at Apple, there has to be a reason, right? But that reason is not to try to convert Apple fans, or even those merely considering Apple’s audio products to try boAt.
boAt itself knows that it competes with brands like Boult, Noise, and the many similar brands that exist on a similar price range. And yet, if boAt seemingly fires a salvo at the top dog in the space, there can only be one reason.
Attention.
Think about it. boAt could have headlined the ad with, ‘The world’s 2nd largest wearable company’. That’s a perfectly legitimate claim to highlight, and one that can make people think along the lines of, “If it is the 2nd largest wearable company in the world, then so many people have consciously bought its products… and it can’t really be bad at all! Plus, it’s roughly Rs. 1,500 a pop, so I won’t lose much anyway. It’s not as if I’m spending Rs. 20,000 on it like Apple!” 🙂
But that claim is the equivalent of what people call in journalism parlance, “Dog bites man”. This claim would also make people curious to know who the No. 1 wearable company in the world is and that is not a direction that boAt would want to send people in. Why? Because, as Col. Nathan Jessep famously exclaimed in ‘A Few Good Men’… “You can’t handle the truth!” 🙂
This is same data point that boAT quotes in its ad too.
So, what is the opposite of ‘dog bites man’? “Man bites dog”!
boAt is the kind of new-age company that goes after communication that can get it irrational attention. In other words, it wouldn’t mind provoking attention for the sake of it. And what better way but to poke the biggest brand out there in the eye! But here’s where things get interesting. The focus of the ad (both print and video) are not about rationally comparing features. It’s about poking the cult of Apple.
That Apple’s fans are a cult is well-known, and there’s little point in skirting around this topic – it is what it is, and Apple proudly feeds on it too.
So, what happens when a beehive is poked? The queen bee couldn’t care less. But the worker bees that have sworn allegiance to the queen would get angry and create mayhem. What happens when people see someone willingly go near a beehive and poke it? People become the audience to see what unfolds – they have rationally kept their distance, but now that someone else doing the poking, it is good fodder for their entertainment.
That would explain the many, many commentaries on the ad campaign (particularly on LinkedIn: here are some, for context: one, two, three, four, five; six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven… there’s a LOT more out there!) from all kinds of people – Apple fanboys, non-fanboys, neutral folks, and just about everyone. This is the kind of ad that most people cannot resist not having a vocal opinion on.
In fact, the print ad is pretty banal, in terms of copy or craft. The kind of poking lacks any real competitive spirit and seems content using the most basic element (and outdated in terms of its usage) of Apple’s marketing: “Think different”. And less said about the picture of the apple the better. At least without that picture, the ad could be said to treat its audience with some intelligence and make them connect the dots from the ‘think different’ caption. But with the picture, it is obvious that this is a pretty low-brow effort, one that reaches everyone in the simplest possible way leaving nothing to the imagination (in the absence of calling out Apple directly and explicitly which may have invited brand/copyright violation, I assume).
It’s the video where the real smarts lie.
Conceived by the agency Moonshot, the narrative frames the Apple cult (represented by the older people in the family) how status/caste superiority is portrayed in India. Replace status or caste with Apple, and it fits perfectly, like a marker of exclusivity and exclusion. The girl is portrayed as someone trying to break free from the stifling clique. Her parting shot, in response to the grandmother’s ‘Log kya kahenge?’ quip, seemed to allude to boAt’s actual rival too—Noise—since she says, ‘Kehne do. Yeh noise acche se cancel karta hai’. It works with dual meanings anyway.
The video ad at least uses intelligent framing and makes the poking entertaining, unlike the plain print ad. But it’s the print ad that got the maximum reaction. It’s that kind of an ad – says very little, leaves out so much that most viewers cannot help but feel compelled to fill in the gaping holes left by it.
The question then is this: can it backfire on boAt?
Think about it.
What would hardcore Apple fans do? They may outrage. And eventually ignore it. They are not going to consider boAt at all anyway. For them, it’s a cheap and tacky shot at their God.
What would those who don’t particularly care for Apple, but do aspire owning its products someday? The ads may arouse their curiosity with a ‘Seriously? They dare poke at THE Apple?’ and take a look at the offerings, reviews, and most importantly the price. The price may seem way too tempting to ignore, particularly in front of Apple’s prices. boAt’s products are the type that you can confidently try without worrying because they are so cheap/affordable. If they are not happy with it, they could eventually save up enough money and buy Apple.
For those who don’t care for brand labels—yes, there are a LOT of people like that too—at the very minimum, the ad would have their attention a lot more forcefully than just an ad that proclaims boAt’s status as the second largest wearable company in the world. It does make a claim that seems unusual (the same level of ‘unusual’ involved in poking a beehive).
So, what’s the downside? Is there a possible reputational damage for boAt as a brand that denigrates another brand to win over buyers? To be sure, the ads do not denigrate Apple the brand or its products. Instead, they point to the cult of Apple as something its devotees indulge in beyond reason/rational thought. Ironically, the solution by the ads is to join another cult – boAthead! But this is hardly a cult, and more of a wishful thinking by the brand.
As for the potential of reputational damage, I don’t think new-age companies care for it as much as most of the older companies do. At least not until they see/face visible and vocal condemnation from a large enough group of people, like what happened with Zomato recently after announcing green uniformed delivery force for “pure veg. food”. The supposed outrage for the boAt ads is at best isolated and very limited.
So, overall, I think boAt’s idea is adequately calculated and well-planned. It knows what it is getting into, the potential (limited) pitfalls, and the possible oversized gains in terms of attention. It’s a tradeoff, but one that boAt would have estimated will end up in its favor.