3Com comes out swinging. Ad effort aims at consumers
amcity.com
Alastair Goldfisher Business Journal Staff Writer
3Com Corp., which in 1995 associated itself with the San Francisco
ballpark formerly known as Candlestick Park, is looking to connect with
more people.
The Santa Clara-based company makes modems, handheld devices and
various other networking products used by Internet and phone
companies.
Last month, it began an estimated $100 million worldwide advertising
campaign to educate consumers--as well as its own employees--about
what it does.
The campaign, created by San Francisco ad agency Foote, Cone &
Belding, revolves around the tagline "More connected."
3Com print ads have been appearing in business and news magazines,
tech-related publications and The Wall Street Journal.
One shows a boardroom in which one executive is telling another to get
voice and video capabilities hooked up to all of the company's computers
in 30 days. The message is that 3Com networking products can tie those
capabilities together.
The marketing effort also includes Web ads.
A TV campaign is expected to launch in the fall nationwide, as well as in
Asia and Europe.
This is the first time 3Com has gone directly to consumers, eschewing
traditional business-to-business advertising that generally targets managers
and product buyers.
Another first: The company will show its brand name on TV.
3Com is not the only networking firm that is going the TV route to jazz up
its image: In January, Santa Clara-based competitor Bay Networks Inc.
launched a television and print campaign to raise awareness of its name.
The campaigns of both 3Com and Bay Networks are in line with those of
more and more Silicon Valley companies.
The goal: brand recognition.
Among big-name valley firms that have begun nationwide branding
campaigns lately are Sun Microsystems Inc., Oracle Corp., Apple
Computer Inc., Hewlett-Packard Co., E-Trade Group Inc. and Infoseek
Corp.
An increasing number of valley tech companies, in particular, are
recognizing the need to market themselves through branding campaigns,
especially on TV, said Dan Bellack, an advertising consultant with Bellack
Consulting in San Carlos.
"It's a lot easier to show emotions and make a general impact when you
have a campaign centered around TV ads," he said. "I think ultimately the
ad campaign will help 3Com."
The new ad push comes after the company made Silicon Valley history
when it paid about $7 billion last year to buy U.S. Robotics Corp. of
Skokie, Ill. The merger was aimed at building a large company to
compete with networking industry leader Cisco Systems Inc. of San Jose.
However, 3Com's earnings fell in its fiscal third quarter ended March 1.
The company reported a profit of $13.9 million, or 4 cents a share, on
revenue of $1.2 billion, compared with a profit of $179.1 million, 54
cents, on revenue of $1.4 billion a year earlier.
The earnings shortfall came on the heels of similar disappointments at
other networking companies, including Bay.
Some analysts say the networking industry slowdown may continue for
the remainder of the year.
But Cisco, which recently launched a campaign with the theme
"Empowering the Internet generation," reported strong earnings.
For its fiscal third quarter ended April 25, it saw a profit of $483 million,
or 45 cents a share, on revenue of $2.1 billion, compared with a profit of
$357 million, 35 cents, on revenue of $1.6 billion a year earlier.
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