In short: Today, the Google Pixel 3 officially goes on sale at many retailers. So Google is kicking the marketing machine into gear now, for the new smartphone. Earlier this week, Google had sponsored Jimmy Kimmel Live and they used the Pixel 3 to film Eminem’s performance of Venom from on top of the Empire State Building, which definitely got a lot of attention. But now, Google is using a number of celebrities in a new ad, that are talking about the Pixel 3. In this video you’ll see celebrities including Gordon Ramsay, Marshmello, Madelaine Petsch, MyLifeAsEva, and Joey Graceffa who all use the phone for various things. This group of celebrities are talking about different features of the phone, including Group Selfie thanks to the new wide-angle front-facing cameras, as well as Fast Charge, dual front-firing speakers, and of course Google Lens. It’s a pretty short and simple ad from Google, but it does show off the big features of the new smartphone, in a way that everyday users would understand what they are how they can use them. This isn’t the first time that Google has used celebrities to promote its smartphone and other products, and Google isn’t the first to do it either. It’s an easy way for companies like Google to get users’ attention by using their favorite people to promote their latest smartphone.
Background: Google has been doing pretty well with promoting its Pixel smartphones since it launched the Pixel back in 2016. Instead of having commercials where it is bashing competitors like Samsung, Apple or LG, it instead is doing quick commercials that show off a bunch of features. So that the user sees the commercial and goes “oh that’s a pretty cool feature” and hopefully goes and buys the Pixel 3. It’s a subtle thing, but it works really well, and of course, that is what matters the most, especially when it comes to TV commercials. Seeing as those commercials aren’t long, so you have to cram in as much as possible. For the longest time, particularly when it was making Nexus smartphones, Google didn’t really market its smartphones. It just announced them and that was it. Which was a bit weird, seeing as how Google is a big ad and search giant. But that has changed with the Pixel lineup, which is definitely good to see here.
Impact: The Google Pixel has been a more widely adopted smartphone since switching from Nexus, and a big part of that is the marketing and the camera. Google has consistently had the best camera on a smartphone, even beating newer smartphones that launched a year later. And for many consumers, that is the number one stand out feature on any smartphone – how well the camera works. While some might want the manual control that you find on DSLRs usually, others just want to open the camera and take a shot. Not worry about adjusting the ISO, shutter speed and other things. And that’s what the Pixel 3 does really well. You can see the full ad from Google down below.