As a parent, I remember watching the Island of Misfit Toys at Christmas time with Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer with my kids. It wasn’t one of my favorite shows, and the animation is better than that from those older shows which was pretty cheesy, but it was still something I had to watch every year. The Miser Brothers Christmas was another one I watched every holiday season.
I have to say I was a little surprised when I saw a commercial for it the other day and saw an Apple I-Phone on the island. I will admit I started laughing when I realized it was a Verizon Wireless commercial making fun of AT&T’s spotty 3G coverage.
This has lead to quite a battle now Verizon has their map commercials all over television and AT&T now has commercials talking about how their coverage is better than Verizon’s. Although I know from my own personal experience that I had horrible coverage in Valley City on my trip up there with my AT&T phone.
The most foolish part is that AT&T filed a lawsuit against Verizon claiming that the map commercials are misleading. In my profession, I deal with cell phone and especially data service coverage multiple times a day. We have Sprint, Verizon, and AT&T phones all over the country and we have fewer coverage issues with Verizon than we do with any other company.
These ads are correct in that Verizon has much better 3G coverage across the country than they AT&T does. AT&T, in their commercials, focuses only on coverage which to me is even more misleading because they do not tell you that certain services may not be available on your phone if you are in the majority of the coverage zones around the country. Verizon has countered that this lawsuit is nothing but a stunt by AT&T to gain more exposure to shoppers in this critical holiday season.
This is all very reminiscent of the battle between AT&T and MCI, as well as Sprint, for long distance customers back in the 1980’s and 90’s. There were lawsuits, false advertisements, as well as misleading commercials all over the industry. This goes to prove that no matter how big of a difference there is with the phones, the marketing and demand for market share will never change.
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OH MAN!
ReplyDeleteYou reminded me of my AT&T fiasco of 1997. I had forgotten all about it until I read your post.
I definitely remember the AT&T/MCI/Sprint LD wars. A friend of mine got a check for $100 for switching to AT&T. So I called up. Yep, you can get that. Got switched right over. A month later, no check. Two months, still no check.
So I called.
No Ma'am, you were not promised $100.
Yes I was.
No You weren't.
Yes I was. Let me talk to your supervisor.
No Ma'am, you were not promised $100.
Yes I was let me talk to your supervisor.
No Ma'am. You were never promised a check. You are not getting a check. You are not getting anything.
Fine, I want to be switched back at your expense (it cost to switch back then).
You have to talk to your phone company about that.
No, I don't. You messed this up. You fix it.
Anyway, I really can't even remember if they paid to switch me back or not. I just remember being very very angry at AT&T for a long time.
And now guess what? My Alltel service has been bought out by Verizon (YAY!) except wait--they have to sell some properties to be legal, so guess who they sold my area to??
AT&T.
Does anyone else remember that commercials back in the day never referred to their competitors by name, logo, or any other defining sign, symbol, or jingle? It always used to be “the competitor’s product,” rather than saying “Verizon’s product” or “AT&T’s product). Personally, I liked those ads, and I’ll bet a lot of companies did too.
ReplyDeleteI don’t think it is right for Verizon to talk about AT&T’s products on their commercial. As you said, they do not provide all of the information to the consumers; they are only providing the information that makes Verizon look better than AT&T. Another thing that bothers me about it is that Verizon is not an expert on the AT&T line, so why are they talking about it? Wal-Mart doesn’t talk about Target or K-mart in their ads….perhaps people should take a lesson…
I know exactly which commercials you are talking about and when I saw the Verizon maps showing how much more coverage they had than AT&T and couldn’t believe the difference. I know down here in Louisiana that AT&T is the dominant phone service because they have the iPhone and EVERYONE down here has the iPhone. My boyfriend had AT&T down here and then moved up north with it and had to switch to Verizon because he had absolutely no coverage and couldn’t talk, text, or get the internet on his phone. I don’t know why AT&T is bringing a lawsuit against Verizon because they are only showing the truth. Verizon’s coverage overall is better than that of AT&T’s.
ReplyDeleteI have seen those commercials. I don't really care about who has better coverage. I have pretty good coverage wherever I need to use my phone. I don't know how I feel about companies showing how other companies suck. I think that it is a good marketing plan however, I think it is kind of a busch league move.
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