There is a line from the upcoming movie, "He’s Just Not That Into You," where Drew Berrymore’s character laments how she gets rejected by seven different technologies, saying dating today is very exhausting. While not involving a break-up, advertisers today, especially those spending mega millions on the Super Bowl have it no less easy. It used to be enough to spend the now millions of dollars on the placements and production. Then, companies had to think about whether to include their URL as well, which has since evolved into which URL – do they show the company page, a product page, or a custom mini-site surrounding the campaign. Next, came the insurance placements, making sure they had a robust presence not just with their website but on other pages where people may come across or search for information around the brand. The obvious candidate being Google where people might not recall the exact company but might recall elements of it. This could easily turn into a talk of Google’s brilliance for in effect forcing companies to spend additional money, but the time and effort doesn’t just include Google. It now must include discussions of the major social networks and communication platforms like Twitter. Who knew we’d hit a time where Mc Hammer was twittering during the Super Bowl?
No discussion of the Super Bowl and its ads would be complete without a look at the economics. The Super Bowl has maintained its media dominance despite the increased fragmentation of content and people’s time and consistently ranks among the top global brands. The Super Bowl is predominantly a television event. Television, though, has certainly had its struggles, some organic – such as the continued fragmentation of media – and some inorganic, i.e. the writer’s strike that cost the networks billions of dollars. The global economic crisis has not helped either with major brands lowering their tv spends and a general sense of concern over the never-efficient but well functioning television advertising process. Given that general environment, there was some real doubt as to whether companies would step up and purchase the super-premium, Super Bowl placements. While we looked forward to the game, we really wanted to see what we could glean by who decided to run. Early bets would have voted against strong revenues, as the meltdown in the financial system hasn’t exactly snuck up on anyone. Combine that with higher prices for the bowl slots, roughly $100,000 per second, and smart money would have thought this year anything but up. Yet, according to NBC, not only were ratings among the highest (95 million) but so was revenue. NBC sold a record $206 million worth of airtime for commercial shown during the Super Bowl and $261 million for the entire day.
Ad sales for the big game hit a wall in September of 2008 as more companies took a second look at the expense, which includes not just the airtime but the cost of production, itself often a 7-figure endeavor. Later in the year, when no one could sugar coat the state of the economy, we even saw stalwarts of the Super Bowl ad menagerie decline to participate, most notably Federal Express, who ended their 12 year streak of showcasing some of the best ads. Their director of advertising explained the decision by saying, "As a country, we are in unprecedented economic waters. And as a responsible employer of more than 290,000 employees and contractors worldwide, there is a time to justify such an ad spend and a time to step back." With them asking their employees to do more with less, he continues by saying, "being in the game simply sends the wrong message both to employees and other FedEx constituents. A Super Bowl ad buy is not where we should put dollars at this time although, in the past, the value of doing so for FedEx has been indisputable." Fortunately, for the Super Bowl, not every advertiser had that level of restraint. And, it brings up an interesting potential irrationality. Does advertising on the Super Bowl make sense as a place to double down, or does it represent an emotional attachment, one without metrics that results in companies afraid of losing mindshare from spending rationally.
Many regular spenders did not show during this Super Bowl, e.g. pharmaceuticals, fast food, and the supermarket staples. It was full of ads that tried to craft 30-seconds around a bad punch line and movie previews, not to mention a representative from the online lead generation industry – Cash4Gold. Flush with $40mm in private equity and hard-up for cash spokesperson Ed McMahon, they didn’t dazzle the critics but certainly had every performance marketer laughing hysterically. Avoiding the phone number, they drove all people to the website, and while various articles suggest not just a spike in traffic but also a solid job of covering the alternate channels (paid search and twitter among them). More interestingly, we can take a stab at wondering if the investment paid off. Savvy pawn shop guys that they are, they didn’t pay retail, but let’s assume they still shelled out $2mm for the spot. At $20 a lead (their desired CPL), they would need 100,000 leads generated, or 0.1% conversion rate off the max attendance, or a 1% conversion rate from a more realistic audience of 10mm viewers. Not impossible, and given the amount of media they buy in general (on and offline), you could argue this segment will lift conversions on those.
So, has direct response finally made its way into the big game? At least for the next year or two when bargains should be had. Don’t go betting the farm just yet on the Super Bowl, but I wouldn’t mind seeing a few of the people in our space get together and share the cost to try. Probably better to avoid advertising the flogs, though.
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