Marketers face pressure to deliver with Super Bowl ads
And thanks to the imploded economy, this one on Sunday may be the all-time pressure cooker. The decision to spend $3 million — $100,000 a second — to air a 30-second Super Bowl ad seems almost indefensible.
It is a particularly sticky wicket after a week in which 70,000 layoffs were announced and labor statistics set a couple of firsts: Unemployment was up in every state in December, and people getting unemployment benefits has hit a record. The quiet question: How many jobs could be saved by not running a Super Bowl spot?
“This is the first Super Bowl of the Great Depression 2.0,” says Steve Hayden, vice chairman at Ogilvy Worldwide perhaps best known as the co-writer of the “1984″ Apple ad that set off the Super Bowl ad frenzy 25 years ago. “Being on the Super Bowl this year is like driving around in a Duesenberg in 1929.”
Don’t tell that to 30-some brands that bought the 33.5 minutes of ad time in the NBC game broadcast, including veterans such as Budweiser, Pepsi and Coke and first-timers such as Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes, Pedigree pet food and Denny’s.
The common goal: $100,000-a-second worth of ad buzz. Buzz means Web hits after the game and, in good times anyway, that translates into sales.
There’s no telling what it means in the worst of times, which is why NBC had two ad slots left Thursday. “I’m not going to tell you it hasn’t been a tough slog,” Dick Ebersol, chairman of NBC Sports, said early this week. “But we have not crashed price in any way, shape or form.”
Advertisers who bought in are rethinking what to air. They’re doing more research. They’re focusing on hallmarks such as heritage. They are even alluding to the economy — some seriously, some with a chuckle.
“The biggest danger every Super Bowl advertiser faces is being ignored,” says advertising research guru Don Bruzzone.
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Marketers face pressure to deliver with Super Bowl ads – USATODAY.com.
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Tags: Business, Marketing, media, Sports, united states
