What You Can Learn From This Years’ Super Bowl Ads
As marketers, we tend to watch commercials through a different lens than your typical consumer. We judge them through a couple of filters:
1) What was the goal? Consumers usually judge ads by their entertainment value. But companies judge things differently. For example, take the Avocados from Mexico spot (“What if Avocados Replaced Apples?”). Anna Faris plays the biblical Eve in an ad that shows us a humorous alternative history. The goal seems clear: to make a big splash! Increasing brand awareness is the quintessential example of what a Super Bowl ad can do. On the other hand, Miller Beer doesn’t really need to increase brand awareness, so it’s going to have different goals.
2) How else could they have spent 30 seconds and $30 million? Even when a commercial is fun, has star power, and is executed flawlessly, it may not be effective. Ask yourself, what COULD they have done with a blank canvas? You give us Jon Hamm and Brie Larson and we’ll come up with a better spot than what Hellman’s mayonnaise gave us (see below).
The Most Effective
PopCorners — “Breaking Bad”
For Breaking Bad fans, this spot was nirvana: Walter White, Jesse Pinkman, Tuco, the RV… it lived up to the hype. We were actually cheering for every reference and callback. But even for non-Breaking Bad fans, the commercial works because it keeps the product front-and-center the whole time. A great result for a brand making its Super Bowl debut.
Pepsi Zero Sugar — “Great Acting or Great Taste?”
Pepsi had a couple of spots featuring Steve Martin and Ben Stiller. They do two things well: first, they don’t take the product too seriously. The creators know it will induce a fair amount of eye rolls. Smartly, they just lean into it: “We know what you’re thinking, try it anyway.” And this is the second thing: it ends with a Call to Action. Perfect execution.
Farmer’s Dog – “A Dog’s Life”
Yes, it’s easy to have our emotions manipulated with a sappy dog story. And it’s very effective if done well. This spot works by imprinting your emotions with the brand name together in your brain. Similarly, Amazon’s spot (about a destructive pup who gets a playmate) humanizes the brand by using – what else – a dog.
These commercials also illustrate an important point: just because a spot doesn’t work for you doesn’t mean it didn’t work. You just may not be in the brand’s target group. Dog owners identify with the spot. The brand doesn’t need to care about anyone else.
CrowdStrike “Trojan Horse”
The simplest concepts usually make for the best commercials. This CrowdStrike spot is a perfect example of using humor to make a point--if only the cyber-security company had been around during the Trojan War. Great execution of a clever idea.
Not So Effective
Blue Moon – “The High Stakes”
After spending 28 seconds making us think this was a spot for Coors and Miller Lite, Blue Moon flashed its logo at the end. These beers may be owned by the same parent company, but the brands are distinct. Whether you liked the ad or not, surely there was a better way to spend thirty seconds.
This is as opposed to the Google Pixel “Magic Eraser” ad which did a great job of entertaining us, plus the product’s benefits were featured the whole time.
Hellman’s — “Who’s in the Fridge?”
Here’s a good example of a missed opportunity. You’ve got Jon HAMM and BRIE Larson and the best you could do is food puns? And if they were trying to be hip – swing and a miss.
Squarespace — “The Singularity”
Adam Driver stars in this spot where he ponders how Squarespace can make websites that makes websites. We’re not sure what the goal was, but they paid a fortune for a commercial that never once tells us why Squarespace is better than its competitors. Just Adam Driver pondering.
We’d like to know what you thought. Agree? Disagree? Which ad was your favorite?