Super Bowl, Super Changes
Another Super Bowl has come and gone. The appeal of the undefeated playing against the “other Manning” made for potential history-making or underdog drama. And it was a sellout!
No I’m not talking about the fans in the stands! I’m talking about the 63 commercials that aired before, during and after the game. For many the most interesting part of the Super Bowl was the anticipation of the commercials! This year an estimated one billion people in 230 countries were not only couch-sitting quarterbacks, but armchair critics of the Anheuser-Busch, Pepsi, Under Armour, Cars.com, Proctor & Gamble, Paramount Pictures and Bridgstone commercials. At a price tag of $2.7 million per :30 spot, those advertisers had a lot “riding on the game,” in light of the fact that their score is determined by the viewers’ perception of their brand and reaction to the commercial! But these days, the exposure doesn’t stop with the TV spot, that’s just the beginning. Take Paramount’s spot to promote the film “Iron Man.” Go online and “Google” “Iron Man,” and the film will be at the top of the search list. Visitors to My Space will see an “Iron Man” profile. So for advertisers today, the Super Bowl commercial is just part
f a Super Bowl campaign! Last year the Super Bowl ad poll on You Tube drew more than 28 million online viewers AND those TV ads were watched 40 million times at American On Line. And dozens of advertisers are using the internet ONLY, but taking advantage of the Super Bowl hype…KFC offered to donate $260,000 to charity in the name of the first player to perform an impromptu “Chicken Dance” in the end zone for three seconds of televised time. The online campaign is www.ShowUsYourHotWings.com. So if you missed a Super Bowl commercial or two but still want to be part of the conversation around the water cooler or at the coffee shop, Verizon Communications is sponsoring AOL’s Super Sunday Ad Poll. All you have to do is just Google the Super Bowl. So here we are, the week after the 42nd Super Bowl, and about the only thing that hasn’t changed in over four decades is the name of the game. It’s still the Super Bowl. At the first Super Bowl in 1967 tickets to the game cost $12, compared to the face value
of $700 or $900 this year. And there is no video of Super Bowl I, because the network didn’t save it. Forty two games later, each viewer can record it. Oh, yes, and the Super Bowl commercials in 1967 cost $42,000, compared to the $2.7 million now. What else is different.
In 1967 we didn’t know the terms used in this commentary:
*online
*AOL
*You Tube
*My Space
*.com
And there’s one final difference. Those of us who watched the Packers beat the Chiefs in Super Bowl I are now XLII older. That’s Colleen’s Comment, and I’ll see you soon, the Lord and weather willing.
email: colleencall@sbcglobal.net
website: www.colleencallahan.com
fax: 309-692-0148
mobile: 309-208-1209