About 30 minutes before Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) unveiled its newest devices Wednesday (September 9), the president of 6S Marketing got a call from a public relations representative attending the media showcase in San Francisco.
“Our PR person said, ‘Hey, I can see 6S in the backdrop at the event,’” Chris Breikss recalled.
The problem was “6S” didn’t refer to Breikss’ Vancouver-based digital ad agency.
It was the official name of the follow-up to Apple’s iPhone 6.
For months, speculation was rampant Apple would name its new iPhone the 6S.
During that time, Google search results for 6S Marketing kept getting pushed further and further down as tech geeks sought out rumours about the new device.
But it wasn’t until Wednesday that it was officially unveiled as the iPhone 6S.
“I was holding out all hope until the very last moment,” said Breikss, who named his company 6S Marketing when it was founded 15 years ago.
“We kind of conceded at that time and it’s something that we’re going to have to live with.”
But 6S Marketing wasn’t content to let it happen without some sort of objection.
In the week leading up to Apple’s big product announcement, the agency launched a campaign urging the tech giant to name the device the iPhone 7.
It rolled out billboards and ads across New York City, where the agency opened a satellite office last year, and the campaign went “semi-viral,” according to Breikss.
“There were over 1,000 links that are now pointing back to our website that are going to help with our search-engine ranking,” he said.
“We feel like we’re coming out actually stronger, not weaker, than when we went in.”
Apple follows a predictable naming convention for its iPhones.
The iPhone 4S followed the iPhone 4, the iPhone 5S followed the iPhone 5 and the iPhone 6S is following the iPhone 6.
But Google searches for the terms “4S” and “5S”reveal companies and organizations that share those names with Apple’s devices have been able to work their way back up to the first page of results over the years.
Breikss said he expects it to impact his company for anywhere between a year and 18 months — about the same amount of time before Apple’s next iPhone is expected to be released.
“We’re going to move away from mentioning Apple and anything to do with the iPhone 6S and just focus on our work and some of the cool stuff we’re doing,” he added.
“We want to be the best, so we’re going to stop associating ourselves with the cell-phone manufacturer.”
