he Super Bowl: More Than a Single Advertising Event—a Social-Media Frenzy Every
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he Super Bowl: More Than a Single Advertising Event—a Social-Media Frenzy
Every year around Super Bowl season, a debate heats up among advertising professionals and media pundits. At the core is the big question: Is Super Bowl Advertising worth the cost? Last year, major advertisers plunked down an average of $3.7 million per 30-second spot—that’s $123,000 per second! And that’s just for the airtime. Throw in ad production costs—which average $2 to $3 million per showcase commercial—and running even a single Super Bowl ad becomes a super-expensive proposition. Among other points, the naysayers assert that with costs so high, there is no reasonable hope for a decent return on the advertising investment.
But supporters of Super Bowl advertising have plenty of evidence on their side. For starters, the big game is always the most-watched television event of the year. Last year’s Super Bowl drew more than 108 million viewers, making it the third-most-watched television event in history (following the 2012 and 2010 Super Bowl telecasts). In addition to sheer numbers of viewers, the Super Bowl stands alone as the TV program during which the ads draw as much or more viewership than the program itself. With that consideration, one recent study asserted that for consumer-packaged-goods firms, the return on investment (ROI) for one Super Bowl ad is equivalent to that of 250 regular TV ads.
Although there’s no easy answer to the question of the value of the Super Bowl as an advertising venue, the debates of the past miss a key factor that has evolved over the last few years. These days, the Super Bowl is merely a gateway to something much bigger. Before the game begins and long after it’s over, ad critics, media pundits, and consumers are previewing and reviewing, speculating, and rating the commercials. No longer do advertisers create an ad that will run for one 30-second time slot. They create a broader campaign that revolves around the Super Bowl ad, with strategies that include tactics for before, during, and after the game.
Before the Game
For many years, advertisers have recognized the potential for water cooler buzz about ads following the Super Bowl. As Internet video became prevalent, the focus turned to creating an ad with the potential to go viral. But in the past few of years, social media and mobile communications have changed the game once again. The previous rule of thumb was to build anticipation for ads by keeping them secret and unveiling them during the Super Bowl. But a few years ago, some advertisers decided to challenge this strategy by seeding information about their ads, releasing teaser ads, or even making the ad available for viewing online before the game—essentially starting the water cooler conversations early.
One of the most successful marketers to pioneer this strategy was Volkswagen, which had a stellar showing during the 2011 Super Bowl with its ad “The Force”—a 60-second spot featuring a pint-sized Darth Vader who surprises himself when he brings a Passat to life. After a heated internal debate over whether to release the spot early and ruin the surprise factor, Volkswagen decided to risk it. The decision paid off as “The Force” racked up more than 12 million views and became the most buzzed about commercial on Twitter before the kickoff of the Big Game. All that pregame buzz helped propel the ad to finish out the year as the most viral auto video, with over 63 million views. More important, Volkswagen reported its biggest increase in U.S. sales in nearly 40 years and was confident that its Super Bowl investment more than paid for itself.
Volkswagen’s success fueled a pregame media frenzy for the 2012 Super Bowl, with 34 out of 54 advertisers posting their ads online in some form in the weeks leading up to the game. Referring to this trend, one media buyer said, “This is the first Super Bowl where social media has been an integral part of marketers’ plans,” suggesting that this is happening because marketers realize “you can get more bang for your buck.” This year, almost all the ads that aired during the Super Bowl were viewable online in one form or another prior to the date of the big game. “So many people are launching commercials early to feed the beast,” says a media analyst.
For Super Bowl XLVII, ad previews were available for ads from all different types of companies. Toyota’s with “Wish Granted” starring Kaley Cuoco as a purple-clad genie gathered more than 11 million online views before the game, more than any other ad. Volkswagen came in at number two with over 6 million views for its ad and another 1.5 million views for the ad teaser.
But there’s more than one way to measure ad success. Social media analytics company General Sentiment puts a dollar amount on this pregame ad screening. Its metric—called Impact Media Value—is a measure of consumer impact and awareness that identifies which Super Bowl advertisers are getting the most bang for their buck prior to the game. According to General Sentiment, numerous advertisers saw a powerful return on their investment in terms of both increased social media mentions and real revenue dollars generated before the game even aired. For example, after prereleasing its “Viva Young” ad online, Taco Bell saw its average daily media value increase from $322,109 to $768,418. Other top performers included Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz, Sketchers, apparel brand Gildan, and first-time Super Bowl advertiser Wonderful Pistachios, with its remake of PSY’s Gangnam Style video.
During the Game
In addition to pre-game festivities, companies are recognizing the potential to increase the effectiveness of their Super Bowl ads by engaging viewers during the game. The trend of “second screen viewing”—using a laptop or mobile device while watching TV—is exploding. One recent Nielsen survey revealed that 88 percent of tablet owners and 86 percent of smartphone owners had used their mobile devices while watching television in a 30-day period, numbers supported by social media activity during the 2013 Super Bowl. Across all social networks, game-related comments were three times higher than for the 2012 event. But more important, nearly 30 percent of the 20.9 million Super Bowl–related tweets sent during the game were about the ads. As a bonus, advertisers picked up thousands of new followers.
After the overwhelming success achieved from its animated “Polar Bowl” simulcast during the 2012 Super Bowl, Coca-Cola was more than ready to do battle in 2013. Nearly 40 executives from Coca-Cola and its advertising, social media, and PR agencies gathered at an office building in downtown Manhattan to manage the brand’s second screen experience. “Mirage,” an ad based on a desert race among showgirls, cowboys, a sheik, and some badlanders chasing a bottle of Coke, had been released online two weeks earlier. Consumers had been given the opportunity to vote for a team, determining which follow-up commercial would air right after the Super Bowl.
Coke’s game-time activities included strategic retorts to Pepsi’s digs at Coke. The team promoted photos being posted by previously identified Coke “super fans” who had been sent props from the filming of “Mirage.” People live-streamed the game, called out plays, and tracked commercials as they aired. But the real activity began when “Mirage” aired. Coca-Cola listening teams for each of five social media platforms—Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Instagram, and YouTube—began executing routines they had practiced during five trial runs prior to the game. They gathered consumer comments into Google Docs while writers crafted responses and others pushed those responses back out through the social media outlets, complete with pre-packaged content.
All the while, voting for the microsite for the ad, CokeChase.com, experienced a massive spike in traffic from 33,000 visitors to over 1.3 million in a matter of minutes, making it difficult for team members to access their own site. Working through technical and other issues to ensure users could get through and vote paid off. As the polls closed, the showgirls were declared the winners. By then, the evidence of the campaign’s success was evident. During the period of the game following the airing of “Mirage,” the Coca-Cola brand experienced 8.2 million interactions and 910,000 votes, far exceeding their internal goals of 1.6 million interactions and 400,000 votes. “The interactions were really critical, in terms of seeing how much people really engaged with the content, so that’s probably the thing I’m most pleasantly surprised with,” said Pio Schunker, senior vice president of integrated marketing at Coca-Cola. “We struck out in a different direction, which was a risk, but it paid off.”
The After Party
For Super Bowl advertisers, when the game is over, the advertising event is still in full swing. The traditional buzz factor results from the numerous “best and worst” lists generated by journalists and bloggers. And although “winners” and “losers” vary from list to list, it is clear that all ads that air on the Super Bowl achieve post-game buzz from all the online viewing and discussion.
Perhaps the greatest example of post-game buzz ever is Chrysler. The long-time number-three U.S. automaker kicked off its “Imported from Detroit” campaign during the 2011 Super Bowl with a two-minute epic featuring rapper Eminem and a resurgent Detroit as the back drop. For 2012, Chrysler produced the two-minute sequel, “It’s Half-Time in America,” a patriotic tribute to the soul of America starring Clint Eastwood. Both ads came out at the top of the heap in terms of pre-game buzz and post-game ratings, discussion, and views. The ads also served as anchors for a series of ads as part of an ongoing campaign. Sixteen months after the launch of the campaign, Chrysler won the Grand Effie—the top award granted at the advertising industry’s Oscars. According to one jury member, “Imported from Detroit was the Grand Effie winner because they sold the product, the category, and the city.”
But as the 2013 Super Bowl debuted, Chrysler revealed that it wasn’t finished with its homage to rock-ribbed American values. Just prior to the second half of the game, the company aired “Whole Again,” a two-minute tribute to the U.S. military and their loved ones narrated by Oprah Winfrey. In the form of a letter from the Jeep brand to the American people, Winfrey intoned, “Because when you’re home, we’re more than a family, we’re a nation . . . that is whole again.” If that wasn’t enough to stand out as a tonic to the light-hearted, silly, and even confusing ads by other brands, Chrysler’s ad during the second half topped off its Super Bowl patriotic three-peat. “Farmer,” another two-minute epic, featured a voiceover of the tribute, “So God Made a Farmer,” rendered by the late and legendary radio voice Paul Harvey. The spot served as a multimedia reminder of the role that perseverance and hard work played in making the United States a great nation. With more than 23 million views between the two ads in the few months following the Super Bowl, Chrysler showed for the third year in a row that it knows how to make ads that deliver long after they’ve stopped airing.
The efforts and successes by the most recent Super Bowl sponsors are far too numerous to mention here. And whether every tactic employed by every advertiser worked perfectly is not the point. The point is that now, more than ever, advertising during the Super Bowl isn’t just about gaining huge exposure by running a single ad or group of ads in a television event with a huge audience. Instead, viewers watch, buzz, share, click, stream, and respond to Super Bowl ads before, during, and after the game. To get the most out of their investments, marketers must have a comprehensive program that takes advantage of the broad Super Bowl season.
Questions for Discussion
1 What factors have played the biggest role in changing the dynamics of Super Bowl advertising in recent years?
2 Discuss the concepts of reach, frequency, and impact as they relate to Super Bowl advertising. How does consideration and planning for these concepts differ between the Super Bowl and other television events?
3 When assessing return on investment, what objectives must Super Bowl advertisers consider?
4 Choose a brand that has not recently run a Super Bowl ad. Design an effective campaign with promotional tactics for before, during, and after the game.
Explanation / Answer
Answer:
Case Summary
These days, conventional publicizing vehicles are moved by new patterns. In any case, The Super Bowl as a publicizing occasion has a splendid methodology identified with this change. This is on account of The Super Bowl has effectively risen turned into the ideal customary publicizing vehicle to react to new patterns in web-based social networking, advertising, and other advancement instruments. This case delineates how organizations have turned a solitary occasion (the Super Bowl) into a promoting grandstand for battles.
Many organizations are occupied with promoting their items in the Super Bowl. Organizations who promote their items in Super Bowl make a crusade before the diversion, amid the amusement, until after the amusement closes. Prior to the amusement, sponsors (organizations) need individuals to be energized. Along these lines, they discharge secret ads in this period. Amid the amusement, there are a few things that should be possible by the organizations, for example, making an application that empowers individuals to play Super Bowl incidental data, and so forth. After the amusement, the rapture can at present be felt. Along these lines, they additionally make a commercial until a couple of months after the fact.
Answer 1:
Cost – the cost for a Super Bowl advertisement is getting higher step by step. It even achieves record costs each year. This has put more weight on advertisers to get the most value for their money.
Extension Scope– the quantity of individuals who see the advertisement of this defining moment likewise develops. It is the greatest TV occasion of the year in the U.S., and likely all inclusive.
Media gadgets – Mobile gadgets make advertisers can achieve watchers some time recently, amid, and after the amusement in various ways.
Developing significance of advertising – Marketers are searching for more approaches to seed great brand data and let columnist and bloggers wrap up. Furthermore, the Super Bowl is made for PR. As an amusement, it's immense. As a promoting occasion, it's much greater.
Web-based social networking – Nowadays, everybody has web-based social networking. It gives a chance to continuous correspondence from organization to client, client to organization, and client to client. Accordingly, more advertisers are swinging to this technique with a specific end goal to all the more completely draw in watchers and amplify their promoting speculation.
Answer 2 :
Reach – Super Bowl has a high number of gatherings of people and much greater when the pre-and post-occasion groups of onlookers are considered in.
Recurrence – as far as how frequently the advertisement really keeps running amid the program is low. Be that as it may, it can be high when joined with online sources, for example, Twitter, Facebook, and so forth.
Effect – Mobile and social advances conveys positive effect to Super Bowl advertisement. It can achieve certain focuses which have not been come to some time recently.
Answer 3:
Surveying deals and benefits straightforwardly is just a single approach to quantify publicizing ROI. Promoters must consider defining objectives and surveying the correspondence impacts of notices.
Answer 4:
Naver LINE
Prior to the Game: holding a public interview, making a trailer, make unique version sticker about Super Bowl. The sticker is legitimate around a month prior to the diversion until a month after the amusement.
Amid the Game: illuminating through LINE official record of Super Bowl about up and coming data amid the amusement. For instance, when the first round starts, there is somebody who refreshes about the score through LINE. It can be refreshed in course of events or send an individual visit to each supporter of Super Bowl's authentic record. This will be exceptionally valuable for the individuals who can't watch the diversion, since they are not at home and their cellphones don't support to sit in front of the TV.
After the Game: making an application or amusement about Super Bowl. Through this amusement, the Super Bowl's fans can associate each other. In addition, it can likewise make a video about tribute of the entire amusement.
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