From space into your pocket
Sony promotes its new Walkman with an alien named Plato
Sony promotes its new Walkman with an alien named PlatoBy Thérèse Balduzzi A cute alien is at the center of a major offensive by Sony Electronics in America for its new Sony Walkman product line. The 21-year-old brand wants to position itself as a trendy brand among a new generation of young music lovers.
Under the title "The Walkman has landed," Sony Electronics is launching in America the biggest campaign it has ever launched for its Sony Walkman brand. The occasion is a new series of Walkman products: the CD Walkman, the MD Walkman (minidisc player) and the Network Walkman and Memory Stick Walkman digital audio players, which can store and play music from the Internet or CDs.
The campaign, in which Sony is said to have invested around $30 million, includes TV commercials, print ads, online advertising, and event and guerrilla marketing. Its target audience is the so-called Generation Y, often called "Why?" by cynics, the stragglers of Generation X, which are the current 14- to 24-year-olds.
The star of the marketing campaign is an alien named Plato. Four TV spots - "Spaceship," "Language Lab," "Dog," and "Dorm Room" - tell how Plato lands on a college campus, takes classes, lives in a college dorm, and relaxes while always listening to music from the new Sony Walkman.
Plato likes to have fun, has a generally easygoing attitude to life and a great sense of humor. He is also technologically up to date, i.e. futuristic, and demonstrates the new digital Walkman models just imported from space to his astonished fellow students.
The spots will air primarily on cable stations, starting with the music station MTV. Print ads will appear in Rolling Stone, The Source and Teen People magazines, and Internet banner ads will appear on CD Now, Launch.com, MTV.com and Shockwave.com. Various links placed on search engines will direct Web surfers to the www. sony.com/walkman Web site, where they can download music.
Teenagers have no
Problems with Plato
The campaign was developed by Young & Rubicam Advertising in New York and aims to restore a trendier image to the Sony Walkman brand, one of the Japanese entertainment multinational's most successful products, which was launched in 1979. It alludes to values such as personal freedom, independence and creativity, and appeals to the savvy use of technology by today's teens.
Research conducted by Sony and Y&R showed that Generation Y listens to a wide range of music and has an optimistic outlook on life. That's why the commercials don't settle on a few musical styles, but eclectically draw from the broad spectrum of popular music.
Above all, the ability to download music from the Internet (or one's private CD collection) and then carry it around in the small, lightweight Walkmans in one's pocket should appeal to this generation and embody a piece of freedom in the 21st century.
Introducing a mascot in the form of the alien Plato is not seen as a gamble by Scott Edwards, Sony Electronics' vice president of marketing communications: "When we tested Plato in study groups, the reactions were very positive. Teenagers accepted him unconditionally and liked his personality."
Under the title "The Walkman has landed," Sony Electronics is launching in America the biggest campaign it has ever launched for its Sony Walkman brand. The occasion is a new series of Walkman products: the CD Walkman, the MD Walkman (minidisc player) and the Network Walkman and Memory Stick Walkman digital audio players, which can store and play music from the Internet or CDs.
The campaign, in which Sony is said to have invested around $30 million, includes TV commercials, print ads, online advertising, and event and guerrilla marketing. Its target audience is the so-called Generation Y, often called "Why?" by cynics, the stragglers of Generation X, which are the current 14- to 24-year-olds.
The star of the marketing campaign is an alien named Plato. Four TV spots - "Spaceship," "Language Lab," "Dog," and "Dorm Room" - tell how Plato lands on a college campus, takes classes, lives in a college dorm, and relaxes while always listening to music from the new Sony Walkman.
Plato likes to have fun, has a generally easygoing attitude to life and a great sense of humor. He is also technologically up to date, i.e. futuristic, and demonstrates the new digital Walkman models just imported from space to his astonished fellow students.
The spots will air primarily on cable stations, starting with the music station MTV. Print ads will appear in Rolling Stone, The Source and Teen People magazines, and Internet banner ads will appear on CD Now, Launch.com, MTV.com and Shockwave.com. Various links placed on search engines will direct Web surfers to the www. sony.com/walkman Web site, where they can download music.
Teenagers have no
Problems with Plato
The campaign was developed by Young & Rubicam Advertising in New York and aims to restore a trendier image to the Sony Walkman brand, one of the Japanese entertainment multinational's most successful products, which was launched in 1979. It alludes to values such as personal freedom, independence and creativity, and appeals to the savvy use of technology by today's teens.
Research conducted by Sony and Y&R showed that Generation Y listens to a wide range of music and has an optimistic outlook on life. That's why the commercials don't settle on a few musical styles, but eclectically draw from the broad spectrum of popular music.
Above all, the ability to download music from the Internet (or one's private CD collection) and then carry it around in the small, lightweight Walkmans in one's pocket should appeal to this generation and embody a piece of freedom in the 21st century.
Introducing a mascot in the form of the alien Plato is not seen as a gamble by Scott Edwards, Sony Electronics' vice president of marketing communications: "When we tested Plato in study groups, the reactions were very positive. Teenagers accepted him unconditionally and liked his personality."
