Why Pay Almost $3 Million for a Commercial?

by Jen Pearsall

February 09, 2010


By Jen Pearsall and Erin Lehr

After every Super Bowl, the hype surrounding the intensely scrutinized (and extremely expensive) advertisements often outweighs — and outlasts — coverage of the actual game itself. Millions of viewers dissect the commercial spots, judging each by their creativity and effectiveness.

Producing a great commercial is essential to building interest in your ad, but a successful PR campaign — sparking conversation before the game takes place — is essential to creating a winning Super Bowl spot. Pre-game PR campaigns help build anticipation, attract more viewers and stimulate the viral chatter around brands, maximizing the effect and impact of an otherwise brief, 30-second message viewed in a cluttered format.

From traditional tactics to increasingly popular (and successful) social media strategies, PR campaigns are building buzz and the effectiveness of Super Bowl commercials. Below are just a few of the companies that created a tremendous splash this year with their ads, long before kick-off. Although these ads may not be our personal favorites, we do think they scored a touchdown when it comes to developing effective PR strategies and leveraging social media for their Super Bowl spots.


Pepsi

You may be asking why we included Pepsi in this list, especially given the brand’s notable absence from Super Bowl commercials this year. That is precisely why we’re including them. Pepsi chose to forgo its usual Super Bowl commercials and replace them with an extensive social media and public relations campaign built around its online Pepsi Refresh Project. The program, which is giving away grants to charitable projects submitted online, is a major foray into a digital and social media-only campaign. And it looks like that is where Pepsi may stay: the company has increased its digital budget for 2010 by 60%. We’ll see how it impacts Pepsi’s bottom line in the coming months – but we expect to see a lot more Pepsi when we’re surfing the net.


Budweiser Clydesdales

Anheuser-Busch originally scrapped its usual Clydesdales Super Bowl commercial, saying that it didn’t resonate well with testers. So why did the ad run on Game Day? One word – Facebook.

When consumers discovered that the Clydesdales ads were being kicked to the curb, they let Anheuser-Busch know they were displeased. And Anheuser-Busch heard them loud and clear. A couple of weeks ago, the company instituted an online voting system through Facebook, allowing consumers to choose which Budweiser ads would play for Sunday’s big game. Although creating more ads than needed before the Super Bowl isn’t unusual for the company (it usually determines which ads will run through consumer testing), voting via social network does mark a first for the beer company. And it seems to have worked for both Anheuser-Busch and the Clydesdales – the beer brand got the pre-Super Bowl buzz it desired, and the Clydesdales were back in the game.


Focus on the Family

Regardless of your political or religious beliefs, the pre-game buzz from the Focus on the Family spot was HUGE. From blogs to national media outlets, it seemed that everyone was talking about this commercial and its controversial subject. But come game time, all we saw was a vague and relatively simple ad that left us thinking, “Was that it?” Yep folks, that was it.

The media strategy employed by Focus on the Family was simple: build momentum and controversial buzz before the game, and then throw a curve ball by showing us an ad that veiled the divisive message. The result:  name recognition for Focus on the Family without any detrimental or polarizing side effects. The ad may have left some puzzled, but this is inconsequential to Focus on the Family. After all, the organization is now on track to be as ubiquitous as other household-name charities like the Red Cross or Salvation Army.


CarMax

In an innovative move for the used car retailer, CarMax leveraged social media and the popularity of a viral YouTube video when creating its Super Bowl ads this year. The company featured two brief ads, both homages to the wildly popular Dramatic Chipmunk video, a 5-second YouTube clip posted in 2007.

CarMax borrowed the music, expressions and camera angles from the original clip, which boasts nearly 20 million YouTube views, and transferred them to their own ads, featuring a “dramatic” prairie dog and parrot. This move resonated with tens of millions of viewers, who immediately recognized the similarities between the new ads and the original YouTube videos. Soon, people across the country were blogging, tweeting and commenting on the commercials. This led to a boost in CarMax’s brand awareness among the enormous digital community. The online talk about the ads then led to their increased views on YouTube and other interactive sites, which in turn led to more and more potential customers hearing CarMax’s message.

What do you think? What were the commercial spots and campaigns that resonated the most with you? Email us at jpearsall@piercom.com or elehr@piercom.com or find us on Twitter.