The Super Bowl is one of America’s most-watched events of the year, and has a growing international audience tuning in online, with commercials now an integral part of the Super Bowl viewing experience.
According to iSpot.tv, of the 128.9 million social actions relating to TV ads last year on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube last year, 10.98 per cent were for ads appearing during the Super Bowl. Following the game this year, YouTube reported that people spent nearly 4 million hours watching game-day ads and teaser videos on YouTube—up from 2.2 million hours from this time last year.
Many in the UK will have watched the Super Bowl using Channel 4 online, Sky Go or Now TV services, and caught the ads as they aired – some of which came at a cost to advertisers of $4.5 million per 30-second spot. So, who came out on top this year?
T-Mobile’s Super Bowl commercial generated the most TV coverage internationally, as analysed by Teletrax. Kim’s Data Stash ad, stars Kim Kardashian West appealing to consumers to “Please, help save the data” in a mock-public service advertisement promoting T-Mobile’s data-rollover plan.
Just behind the Kims’ Data Stash ad, Dove’s Real Strength was the second most broadcast ad, with KIA’s The perfect Getaway starring Pierce Brosnan, Mercedez-Benz’ Fable and Toyota’s Let’s go Places in third, fourth, and fifth place, respectively.
News and lifestyle TV programmes generated the most earned media for the brands that ran commercials during the Super Bowl. There were regional differences in coverage: while T-Mobile’s commercial was the most aired in APAC, Europe saw a slight preference for the Dove’s ad, starring the ex-James Bond actor.
In addition to traditional broadcast buys, marketers also used digital to engage with the Super Bowl audience. During the competition, brands used the Teletrax platform to enable TV-synced contextual cross-screen advertising on desktop, mobile and social around certain key in-game events in real-time. This enabled advertisers to own crucial moments during the Super Bowl, and engage with audiences. Within seconds after a touchdown, field goal or take over, brands showed a contextually relevant message on digital.
“As we witnessed last year, the competition for brands to generate awareness begins before the Super Bowl. We’re seeing ads getting released days if not weeks before the game actually occurs,” said Andy Nobbs (pictured), CMO of Civolution. Civolution uses the Teletrax platform to track earned and paid media for Super Bowl brands across 2,100+ channels from more than 60 countries, including all 210 markets in the United States, representing all measured US television households.
“The willingness of brands to showcase their most expensive ads of the year so far in advance of their planned airdate further demonstrates that great advertising resonates not only domestically, but with global audiences as well.”
