Apple extends iPhone 5c ad push to Rolling Stone magazine

tumblr 5c ad

Continuing with its advertising push for the iPhone 5c, Apple has taken out a high-profile ad in this month’s issue of Rolling Stone. The print ad, which resembles the art we have seen in online spots, can be found on the back cover of the magazine.

Earlier today we noted that Apple had launched a rather aggressive campaign for the handset, which it launched last fall. In the past few weeks, animated 5c ads have popped up on expensive real estate, including Yahoo.com and NYTimes.com…

Now this isn’t the first iPhone 5c print ad—newspaper ads and street signage have been around for months—and it’s not the first magazine ad either. But that Apple would pay for the back of the Rolling Stone in addition to everything else is noteworthy.

5c rolling stone

Pundits have been suggesting for months that the 5c is a failure–some have even pointed to this new ad campaign as evidence of that. But there’s a big difference between 5c sales being meh and Apple is experimenting, or 5c sales being terrible and Apple is desperate.

I’m guessing it’s the former. As we’ve said before, Tim Cook and company are in uncharted territory right now. They’ve never had to market an iPhone against a better iPhone. They’ve had few marketing problems period. It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out.