The Stratecon Group, Inc.
Strategic Concepts in Marketing
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February 08 Beacon
Super Bowl Ads Don't Always Score
 
OK, as a marketer, I watch the Super Bowl as much for the advertisements as I do for the game. Published reports say that advertisers paid as much as $2.7 million for a thirty-second spot. It is a high risk, high stakes game. Do a good job and your brand can move up in stature with consumers. Do a great job and your company will be the hit of the water cooler discussions for weeks to come. All of which, we hope, will generate sales.
 
Unfortunately, many Super Bowl advertisers waste their money. How does this happen? These companies hire the biggest name advertising companies in the industry...the best and the brightest advertising minds in the country. Where do they go wrong...how can they come up with this drivel.
 
The epic Apple Computer "1984" advertisement was the first mega-hit from any advertiser. To be sure, Budweiser has shown continued quality advertisements throughout their run as a key sponsor. But 1984 became an event. An amazing accomplishment, considering that it only ran once!
 
Then in the dot com years, companies...many of whom bet their entire advertising budgets on the Super Bowl...tried to amp up the outrageous factor to be noticed. Many advertisers incorrectly assume that all NFL fans are immature adolescents for whom pre-adolescent potty humor is a real turn-on. And so we were subjected to a rash of stupid, body-function humor.
 
In new research from comScore, we learn that you can damage your brand with poor advertisements. The survey asked 1,139 Internet users to rate the brand image of Super Bowl advertisers. Many showed big image gains. Hyundai, Anheuser-Busch, and Bridgestone all improved their image by 40-45%.
 
But while SalesGenie.com showed a 21% image improvement, they also had 18% who said that they damaged their brand's image. In other words, the ad hurt them as much as helped them! Oh well, there goes another $3,000,000!
 
When asked which ads they would like to see again, Anheuser-Busch was first with 49%, Pepsi was second with 28%, and Coca Cola wis third with 25%.
 
So which ads did you like? I won't give you an exhaustive list, I actually thought that there were many that were good. My surprise favorites were:
 
 
Tide To Go: This ad featured a job interview in which the interviewee had a stain on his shirt. The stain competed with his answers to the interviewers question. It was a great way to visually communicate the message that had the interviewee used a Tide to Go stick, his interview would have gone much, much better!
 
 
 
 
 
Budweiser: Based on the "Rocky" theme music, this ad showed a Dalmation dog helping a Clydesdale horse qualify to be a Budweiser team horse. Cute, funny and very professional. Well done!
 
 
 
 
 
Garmin: My height-challenged friends may take some offense from this Garmin ad...but hopefully they don't take themselves too seriously. This ad features Napoleon on his way to review the troops thanks to a Garmin GPS system. As he races around France in his car(?), we can only see and hear the directions from his Garmin GPS. Upon arrival, he sees his troops watching and hides his Garmin in his coat...thus striking his familiar pose.
 
 
There are several places on the web where you can review the ads, which by the way, extends their value to advertisers. One good one is Super Bowl Ads.