IERI (Yesterday) I told you that RIM could be behind a campaign which had as its target the Apple company and a store of its own in Sydney, and today I tell you that RIM has admitted officially this. The company hired an advertising agency from Australia to promote an event and chose to organize a flashmob in front of an Apple store where it blocked the activity and asked the company's customers to "wake up". The bad part for RIM is that all the attention of the event went to Samsung, which was seen as the main culprit for the whole scene, all because Samsung has a not very good attitude towards Apple customers.
A stunt by BlackBerry maker Research in Motion (RIM) designed to make fun of Apple has backfired on the ailing company, say commentators. RIM today owned up to being responsible for an extended protest outside Apple's Sydney CBD store last week after online sleuths traced the source of the publicity stunt. But the marketing ambush comes as too little too late, says Tiphereth Gloria, social media strategist at VML Australia.
This whole story brought RIM people only headaches, because the company had to admit that it did not pay some Australian bloggers to be present at the event and write about it. Practically, RIM spent a substantial amount of money, but the final result is far from the company's expectations. RIM was an interesting, sophisticated company, which did not seem to take over the habits of those from Samsung, but the need for advertising pushed them to abandon logic and unfortunately the final result is far from good.
