In my last blog post, “Multicultural Copywriting & Transcreation – A Bigger Than Bigger Challenge”, I have described how the simplified Chinese translation (for the Mainland China market) of the Apple’s iPhone 6 slogan “Bigger than bigger” (translated to “比更大还更大”) has provided much social amusement for Chinese netizens. Although Apple quickly changed it to “岂止于大“ (“It’s not just bigger”), the one they had originally introduced for the Hong Kong and Taiwan markets, the eggs had already landed on the face.
However, like an effective quarterback sneak, Apple’s team raised from the social media embracement ashes, successfully scored a touch down in the BIG challenge: the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus Chinese video ads.
The challenge: how to keep the high-tech, polished, elegant, top-brand image but communicate in a straight forward, no nonsense tone that will resonate well with local Chinese?
The solution: keep the image as is, but find two famous local talents for the VO, who converse in a way that is very familiar to local Chinese.
The ad speaks for itself. It is praised by the netizens as the most “接地氣” (down to earth) ad.
Big big big big, big big big big, big big……….
Congratulations on the BIG comeback, Apple!
– Iris
Image source here.
