Regarding Microsoft’s IE8 marketing and ”creative” product comparisons
Microsoft has been drumming up its marketing for Internet Explorer 8 lately, with some interesting results. That marketers can be a bit, shall we say… “creative”… when touting a product is well known, but the question is if Microsoft’s marketing team hasn’t taken it a bit too far with their “Get the Facts” campaign, especially when they start comparing IE8 to other web browsers.
We will let Microsoft’s browser comparison table speak for itself…
And that was just the browser comparison page. They also have a “mythbusting” page with even more creative claims. Here’s an example from that section on Microsoft’s campaign site (emphasis in the last paragraph was added by us).
Myth #3: Firefox is a richer, more adaptable browser than Internet Explorer.
The Real Deal: Internet Explorer 8 has much more functionality than other browsers, built in from the minute you open it.
Internet Explorer 8 has much more functionality than other browsers, and its functionality is there from the moment you open the browser. Internet Explorer 8 offers almost all of the features the most popular add-ons in Firefox have, and you’re able to personalize your browser in a way that saves you time and research.
Did you know that there are more than 1,700 Internet Explorer 8 add-ons available at the Add-ons Gallery, with more being added every day? Partners all over the world are building Accelerators, Web slices, and Visual Search plug-ins for your browser, including Facebook, Amazon, eBay, and much more.
A quick look at the Mozilla Add-ons page for Firefox reveals that there are more than 5,000 Firefox add-ons available. So how does that hold up, Microsoft?
Ok, the spin is of course in the fine print “its functionality is there from the moment you open the browser,” but still, this almost brings to mind the spin-doctoring we did for the Save IE6 campaign (which was a joke).
We think it’s great that Microsoft is improving IE with new versions (and IE8 is a big leap forward), but maybe its marketing team was a bit too creative this time…
If you haven’t seen the breakdown of Microsoft’s IE8 marketing campaign over at Wired’s Webmonkey blog, check it out. It’s pretty entertaining.
Want to see how your favorite US sports site is doing, if it has a perfect 100% uptime score or not? If you want to check the latest scores and it isn’t working, could it be a problem with your computer or connection, or the site? We’ve got the solution for you!
The New England Patriots held what seemed to be a commanding lead (17-15) with five minutes left of Super Bowl XLVI last night. But the New York Giants came back and managed to win with 21-17.
As Super Bowl 46 is approaching, fans will flock to the Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, Indiana, and to TV sets around the world to follow the New York Giants battle it out with the New England Patriots.
Kenny Brunton
June 22nd, 2009 at 6:11 pm
OK, I’ve finally stopped laughing now but my side is so sore I could probably start crying all over again. What a load of complete nonsense.
For a start, did they even bother to test this lot out on an older PC? The machine I’m using is around seven and a half years old (Yes, I know most people don’t have cars that old) and I run most browsers for compatibility testing. From my experience IE8 in fact loads many pages VISIBLY slower than Chrome as far as I can see. There’s not a huge amount to compare Chrome and Firefox, although Chrome has the edge slightly. However, when it comes to cold startup times, again, Chrome has it in the bag and is therefore my browser of choice for the time being.
I used to have a lot of respect for Microsoft but it’s gradually being eroded away with stunts like this.
Adam
June 22nd, 2009 at 7:42 pm
Oh boy, that is just hilarious
umpirsky
June 23rd, 2009 at 4:24 am
“Myth #4: Internet Explorer doesn’t play well with Web standards.” – So true.
Nathan Lee
April 28th, 2010 at 1:42 pm
Internet Explorer 8 is very good because it is as stable as Opera. I hate the previous versions of IE like IE6 because it hangs frequently. ‘