Shake This Ad: Dockers Uses iPhone In Unusual Marketing Effort

imageDockers, the apparel-maker known for pleated slacks and casual Friday’s, is the latest advertiser to jump on the iPhone bandwagon. AdAge.com reports that the iPhone appealed to the San Francisco-based company because it gave a way for users a way to interact with its ad using the phone’s accelerometer. Users shake the phone in order to see Seattle urban street dancer, Dufon, dance in a pair of Dockers. The ad will appear in several iPhone games, including iBasketball, iGolf and iBowl, and is similar to applications released by Gap and Target for the holidays. The Gap app allowed people to mix-and-match outfits with the swipe of a finger, while Target allowed you to search for gifts by shaking a virtual snow globe. The big difference is that the Dockers ad will appear in a free game that a user might want to download anyway, whereas Gap and Target were asking users to download their standalone apps.

Patti Sircus Bender, director of brand marketing at Dockers, told AdAge that the ad is targeting tech-savvy 30- to 39-year-old men. “With the introduction of the iPhone and other technologies, it became clear to us that we need to talk to our target when and where he’s open to our message.” In this scenario, “he’s in gaming mode and in the mood to be entertained.” The ad was created by OMD, Docker’s media agency, and Razorfish is Docker’s online and creative agency of record. The iBasketball app is available today, but the ad isn’t launching until later this week. It will run for four weeks.

Photo Credit: AdAge.com.

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