Sony's 'Star' Campaign for DVD Camcorders

May 2, 2006 - On Sunday night Sony gave a gentle tug at the heartstrings of America by rolling out a new marketing campaign for their DVD camcorders. The 60-second TV spot, titled “Star,” debuted during ABC’s “Desperate Housewives.”

The "star" of the show wears Sony's inconspicuous EWC-HM1 Bluetooth mic.

The commercial, created by Bagby and Company, features the Sony DCR-DVD505 in the hands of doting parents taping their son’s musical performance. The child, wearing an enormous, blinking ECW-HM1 Bluetooth microphone strapped to his aardvark costume, could not possibly be missed. Nevertheless, he comes home in a funk, certain that he was not the star of the show. The parents then remove the DVD from the camcorder and play it back in their Sony-brand home DVD player. Sure enough, the child’s image and voice rise above the rest, reassuring the boy that he was the most beloved and special one in the show.

Said Diane Ozawa Roche, Sony's Director of Marketing Communications, "Our marketing campaign uses an emotional trigger while demonstrating our product advantages in the most compelling and relevant way possible. Sony understands that the special moments in life are as much about sound as they are about sight--especially when it involves the voice of a loved one--this is what families want to experience and savor.”

Of course, if Sony is successful in their strategies, it won’t be long before the entire stage is filled with children blinking like DC10s circling an airport. There may not be a chance for that, however. Though Sony is the market leader in camcorder sales, with significant growth in the DVD market, overall consumer interest in camcorders has declined. This ad campaign is part of a new tactic to link Sony with what Bagby and Company calls “an emotional value that resonates with the target,” 25 to 54 year olds whose lives center on the domestic.

Sony’s shift from MiniDV to more user-friendly DVD camcorders reflects this strategy. This year, the company released only four new MiniDV models, while introducing five new DVD camcorders, including the DVD505 featured in the commercial.