Apple’s iPhone partners may be working overtime to enhance the phone maker’s image.
Poland Orange, Poland’s largest mobile operator, has launched a pre-iPhone 3G marketing campaign that is paying dozens of actors to stand in line to buy one of the new devices, according to a Reuters report. And Orange isn’t trying to hide it, either.
“We have these fake queues in front of 20 stores around the country to drum up interest in the iPhone,” a spokesman told Reuters. The wire service reported no queues at T-Mobile’s Era stores, which will also began selling iPhone 3Gs on Friday.
The Orange spokesperson told the Associated Press that “the aim was to ‘warm up’ the atmosphere around the launch of the iPhone.”
Following the Beatles’ Footsteps
AT&T didn’t need to resort to such marketing stunts when the iPhone 3G launched in the U.S. on July 11. Apple sold one million iPhone 3Gs in just three days. Twenty-one countries have been selling the iPhone 3G since July 17. Of course, no one knew the iPhone 3G was going to run into problems with reception and Apple’s MobileMe synchronization service.
Will this stunt spur Polish consumers to purchase iPhones? Or will it somehow backfire on Apple — even though Orange is setting up the campaign?
“If you’re as antique as I am, you may recall that when the Beatles first came to America, they premiered on the Ed Sullivan show,” said Rob Frankel, a branding expert with clients like Honda, Microsoft, Sony and Marriott hotels.
“What a more naive American public didn’t know was that most of the girls in the audience were hired and paid to scream as part of the hype,” he said. “And it worked, big time.”
“This is really nothing new, though. For centuries, various civilizations have watched as the families of kings and noblemen paid…