February 4, 2013

Super Bowl XLVII #AdBowl: More Social Integration

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The Super Bowl always brings out the big money ad spenders. With a :30 second spot clocking in at $3.7 million, it isn’t called the Big Game for nothing. The E-Trade talking baby, Danica Patrick and the Anheuser-Busch InBev Clydesdales are back in the Super Bowl – and CBS was sold out of its XLVII advertising inventory months ago.

Anheuser-Busch InBev is likely the Super Bowl’s largest ongoing sponsor. Logging four and a half-minutes of air time for XLVII, they split the spend between promotion of the new Budweiser Black Crown, Beck’s Sapphire and the company’s iconic Clydesdale horses (including a new foal). Budweiser also unveiled an official Twitter account on January 28 as a digital extension of its broadcast campaign.

Pepsi Next released a campaign video early Super Bowl morning, pushing it through YouTube and BuzzFeed ads to create buzz for the product when big-game chatter drowns out everything else. The latest in Pepsi Next’s ongoing partnership with comedy website Funny or Die, “Vending Machine” (spoofing Coca-Cola’s ad) culminates a week of Super Bowl buildup, including a teaser video called “Shopping” that released on January 28, and a long-form version of its Party ad which aired as a :30 spot during broadcast. Other social outreach for the soft drink brand included a Pinterest contest on its Facebook page and a special offer of a 2-liter bottle of Pepsi Next for the first one million people to complete the form on their site.

Coca-Cola’s Coke Chase spot showed three factions – badlanders, cowboys and showgirls – racing across the desert in pursuit of a bottle of Coke. The spot, which released online on January 22nd, urged viewers to choose a winnner via website voting. Remember gamification? Coca-Cola has recaptured it here with this spot, encouraging viewers to vote and choose the outcome all through the Super Bowl with a spot airing the winning faction immediately following the conclusion of the game. Another first: Domino’s has a cameo as part of their partnership with Coca-Cola.

Oreo’s :30 second spot pitting fans of the cookie crunch against those who like the creme filling aired during the first half of the game, but it’s been their quick-response content ads that’ll keep people talking. Just minutes after a power outage at the Superdome, Oreo answered with a brilliantly designed ad via their Twitter account.

Instagram was a big part of the campaign – Oreo created cookie & creme sculptures of Instagram images submitted to its Facebook page. Brilliant play!

Super Bowl XLVII’s ad entries further integrated social and digital marketing with branded hashtags. While Super Bowl ads are only a fraction of consumer-facing ads, they are a bellwether for advertising trends for the rest of the year. Deeper integration of social and digital through branded hashtags, user-generated content and distinct URLs will continue to trend.

Which ad was your favorite? Which brand had the best digital integration? Leave a comment and join the discussion. 

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About the Author
Glen Kosaka

Glen Kosaka is the CEO and Founder of Rignite. He’s the guiding force behind Rignite’s mission to help businesses grow through social media.