Summary: “It’s a New Day: Microsoft’s Office 2007 Launch Capaign” by Mohanbir Sawhney

Summary: “It’s a New Day: Microsoft’s Office 2007 Launch Capaign” by Mohanbir Sawhney This case discusses the challenge Jordan Passon, advertising director for Microsoft Office, and her team approached the marketing plan for the launch of Office 2007. The launch was particularly challenging because the marketing team needed to help their customers re-imagine the product. The case indicates that many of Microsoft’s customers felt that the existing product was “good enough”. In response to the challenge and utilizing information learned during the, relatively unsuccessful, launch of Office 2003, Passon’s team developed a strategy to stimulate awareness of Office 2007. Their campaign could be expressed as an equation, “Version Awareness+Product Experience = Perception Change”. The first step to the team’s campaign approach was to create awareness using traditional media such as billboard advertising. The second phase of the campaign was to utilize digital media to help the customer interact with the product directly. In considering the case in today’s environment, the use of digital media and the creation of a venue for customer’s to interact with the product seems almost common sense. Yet, it is important to recognize that in 2007 the concept of digital experiences and “experience-based” marketing was relatively new. The shift in marketing methodologies was just beginning. I believe that directing advertising funds to the creation of an interactive experience for customers would be a good decision in this case. It seems a reasonable argument to say, just as a consumer in a store is more likely to buy something once they touch it, a user of a software program or application is more likely to purchase it once they have interacted with it. It seems that some of the most successful companies are companies that have figured this out. When I think about