Image Courtesy: Samsung
Samsung has found an unusual way to promote its latest foldable phone, enlisting a New Zealand real estate agent named Tim Cook to praise the Galaxy Z Fold 8 in a playful jab at Apple.
The Tim Cook featured in the campaign is not Apple’s longtime CEO. He is a gray-haired, bespectacled real estate agent from Palmerston North, New Zealand, who bears a striking resemblance to Apple’s former chief executive. Samsung New Zealand released the ad as Apple entered the foldable-phone market.
The ad opens with the line, “Tim Cook has an announcement. And for once, it’s about Galaxy,” before the New Zealander sits against a minimalist white background and reviews Samsung’s latest foldable.
Describing the Galaxy Z Fold 8, the other Cook says the phone offers “the best of both worlds.” He praises its compact size when folded for tasks such as texting, while highlighting the larger display available when the device is opened.
The timing is deliberate. Samsung released the Galaxy Z Fold 8 in July, giving the company another opportunity to emphasize its head start in the foldable-phone market. Apple has only recently entered the category with the iPhone Duo, announced September 9 as the first major product launch under new CEO John Ternus.
Foldable phones are increasingly being positioned as devices that can combine the portability of a smartphone with the larger screen of a tablet or laptop. Bloomberg technology reporter Mark Gurman has predicted that larger displays in pocket-sized devices could become increasingly important to consumers.
Samsung has a long history of poking fun at Apple in its advertising. Its 2018 “Ingenius” campaign mocked the iPhone X’s notch and the removal of the headphone jack, among other features. Google has also used similar tactics, including a Pixel campaign that criticized Apple’s slow rollout of Siri-related artificial intelligence features.
Samsung has continued the theme with its latest “Switchers” campaign, which uses clinical psychologist Orna Guralnik to humorously address people’s reluctance to change smartphone brands.
The company now has an especially convenient punchline: if switching to Samsung is good enough for a Tim Cook, perhaps it is worth considering for everyone else.
