Crisis Communications: IPhone's Privacy Ad

Recently, I saw Apple’s newest commercial that I will call the privacy commercial. The ad comes after a bug was exploited on the iPhone. In seeing this, I am a bit unsure if this was a good strategy. Privacy is obviously important for everyone, but this particular ad seemed to push it on the audience in a way that does not seem genuine.

One of the most important things in crisis communications/management is to be genuine and to come across as genuine. I think the ad could have been done in a way that accomplished Apple’s goal and ensured the public that Apple cares about its users’ privacy. What exactly that ad would be? Well, I would leave that up to the ad’s agency, but in reading comments on videos about this ad, it seems like people aren’t buying it either. My personal suggestion would be to show how you can keep you iPhone private in a creative way.

At the end of the day; however, I think consumers will still purchase Apple products and I think many people are aware of the fact that privacy can be limited in the world of the internet and smartphones. In my opinion, I don’t think this ad was needed, especially in the context of crisis communications. I don’t think it hurt Apple, but I’m not sure if it helped them in any capacity.

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Photo by Luke van Zyl on Unsplash