高通花大钱提高知名度

    最近在拉斯维加斯举行的消费电子展上，见证了高通公司（Qualcomm）开幕主旨发言的人都知道，这家手机芯片制造商正试图在大众市场获得关注。不然，它何必请来卡通角色“大鸟”（ Big Bird）、诺贝尔和平奖得主德斯蒙德•图图大主教以及知名摇滚乐队Maroon 5担任嘉宾？原来，这只是高通努力提升品牌认知度的第一步。在新任首席营销官阿南德•钱德拉塞克的带领下，这家位于圣地亚哥的公司正展开营销活动，旨在激起消费者对手机和平板电脑中那小小芯片的关心。活动的投资规模之大，前所未有。

    为此，高通推出了一系列“病毒视频”，当然还有更多的传统广告。本周二，该公司发布了最新的在线视频，据称是为了展示移动技术让人们的生活更美好。视频描绘了一个贴了一系列海报的公交车站，海报上的说明文字有“有急事？”、“感到无聊？”等。每张海报上都印有一个网址。等车的上班族在手机中输入该网址，就会激活一条相关的笑话。例如，一个留着胡子的年轻小伙在这个巴士站看到一张海报上写着“全都看过了？”然后在自己手机中输入了相应网址。过了一会儿，屏幕上一群爱斯基摩犬拉着带轮子的雪橇一溜烟跑过。（继续观看的话，你还将看到一名小丑、一位手风琴师，还有一个踩着高跷的哥们。）

    高通全球营销高级总监莉雅•谢里夫表示，这段时长两分钟的短片中，所有镜头都是通过隐藏摄像机偷拍的——也就是说短片中等车的人都是真人，而不是职业演员。不过，尽管有些公司的“病毒视频”营销活动大获成功，但通过YouTube传递真实和幽默感仍非易事，即便短片中出现的猫猫狗狗再多也无济于事。高通的挑战在于，虽然它的芯片驱动着全球众多款最畅销的手机和平板电脑，但它的品牌在普通消费者中没太大影响力。“我们是一家市值1,000亿美元的公司，但却鲜为人知。”在最近的采访中，高通首席营销官钱德拉塞克对《财富》（Fortune）记者如是说。

    钱德拉塞卡曾为高通的竞争对手英特尔（Inter）效力达25年之久。他在英特尔担任过多个职位，加盟高通前，他是移动事业部负责人。钱德拉塞卡称：“随着移动技术成为计算机和消费电子业的焦点，移动半导体行业变成了众矢之的。看看那些有意进军这个行业的公司，许多都相当善于进行市场推广。如果我们不通过营销活动造势，那就是犯傻。”

    Anyone who witnessed Qualcomm's opening keynote at the recent Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas knows that the mobile chipmaker is trying to get some mass market attention. What else could explain guest appearances by Big Bird, Archbishop Desmond Tutu andMaroon 5? Turns out, that was just Qualcomm's opening gambit in a major effort to become more widely recognized. Under the direction of its new CMO, Anand Chandrasekher, the San Diego-based company is spending more than ever on a marketing campaign that aims to get consumers to finally care about the teeny-tiny chips inside of their phones and tablets.

    Qualcomm (QCOM) hopes to achieve this goal through a series of viral videos -- and, of course, more traditional ads like this one. On Tuesday the company is releasing its latest online video, which it says is supposed to show how mobility makes users' lives better. The video depicts a bus stop that has been outfitted with a series of posters, with captions like "IN A HURRY?" and "BORED?" Each poster features a URL. When commuters waiting for the bus tap the URL into their phones, it activates a related gag. For example, a young bearded guy at the bus stop sees a poster that says "SEEN IT ALL?" and enters the corresponding URL into his phone. Moments later, a pack of huskies trot by pulling a sled on wheels. (Keep watching, and you'll also see a clown, an accordionist, and a dude on stilts.)

    Qualcomm's senior director of global marketing, Liya Sharif, says all of the shots in the two-minute-long clip were candid and taken from hidden cameras -- meaning that the commuters in the video were real-life people waiting for the bus, not actors. But despite the massive success some companies have had with viral video campaigns, coming across as authentic and humorous via YouTube (GOOG) is no slam dunk, no matter how many cats are involved. Qualcomm's challenge is that, while its chips power many of the world's top-selling phones and tablets, its brand doesn't have much clout among everyday consumers. "We're a $100 billion company that's almost unheard of," CMO Chandrasekher told Fortune in a recent interview.

    Chandrasekher spent about 25 years at rival Intel (INTC). He held many positions while at the company, but his most recent gig was running Intel's mobile group. "As mobility has become the center of the computing industry and the consumer electronics industry, there's a fairly big target on the mobile semiconductor space," he says. "And as you look at the companies interested in making inroads into that space, many of those companies are reasonably sophisticated from a marketing standpoint -- it would be silly for us to ignore what marketing can do."