Microsoft’s Scroogled campaign has been a concentrated effort to attack Google’s core values and paint them as a company who invades your privacy. While the campaign kicked off around the Thanksgiving holiday timeline, it looks like the Scroogled campaign has been put to bed, for now.
The marketing campaign was directly targeted at Google and its antics relating to user privacy. Everything from paid shopping results to user emails being scanned for advertisements was part of the marketing effort by Microsoft.
There have been mixed reviews about the advertisements with some saying that the made Microsoft look desperate at finding a way to knock Google off of its pedestal to others loving the fact that Microsoft finally took some deep shots at Google’s antics. Whatever the end result, Scroogled run looks to be over, for now, as the company will likely look for new ways to build brand equity and increase its user base.
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Even though the Scroogled campaign was not loved by all, it is good to see Microsoft going out and being aggressive with is marketing approach. Apple famously launched a smear campaign against Microsoft with its "I’m a PC" commercials that many believed to be one of the best campaigns in history, but you have to walk a fine line between substance and message to have a tasteful delivery.
With this campaign winding down, Microsoft has just launched a massive Outlook.com campaign that will run for some time to help build the brand awareness around the new email service.
We reached out to Microsoft to confirm that the scroogled marketing campaign has been completed; we will update this post with their response.
We reached out to Microsoft to confirm that Scroolged was coming to an end and Microsoft provided us with the following comment:
The Scroogled campaign has sparked a dialogue that shows how much consumers care about their privacy, and how strongly they feel about the fact that Google goes through their personal emails to sell ads. More than 3.5 million people visited Scroogled.com, and over 114k signed a petition asking Google to stop going through their Gmail. While the ad portion of this phase of the consumer education campaign has finished its scheduled run, this important conversation about privacy continues, and so does this important consumer choice.
Editor’s Note: After receiving comment from Microsoft, the original title of this article “As Microsoft winds down Scroogled advertisements, Outlook.com lights a few fires” was amended to the current title.
Source: KQED | Image via Microsoft
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