Pomegranate and YouTube Bring You The Best Commercials for Super Bowl XLIV
January 27, 2010 by Renee Gannon
Super Bowl XLIV is coming and there's no stopping it...
With an average U.S. audience of 98.7 million viewers (and an estimated total viewership of 151.6 million), the 2009 Super Bowl was the most-watched Super Bowl in history, and the second-most-watched U.S. television program of any kind (trailing only the final episode of M*A*S*H in 1983, which drew an average audience of 106 million).
With ratings like that, one can only wonder if all those people actually tune in to watch the football portion of the show. It is probably safe to assume that a small percentage tune in mostly for the half-time show and another, much larger percentage are in it for the commercials. In my personal opinion, the Super Bowl is watched almost as much for the commercials as it is for the game, with some of the most well-known brands paying millions of dollars to out-do themselves from previous years by turning those millions of advertising dollars into a buzz-worthy campaign that football fans will be raving about months down the road.
Let's review some past Super Bowl commercial successes...
In addition to featuring the game's first 1-second TV ad (courtesy of Miller High Life), Super Bowl XLIII marked the first time that a 30-second commercial time slot cost up to US $3 million for the airtime alone, excluding production and talent costs. Many traditional advertisers, such as Anheuser-Busch and PepsiCo, bought multiple ads at discounted rates. None of the "Big Three" U.S. automakers (General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler) ran advertisements during the game.
The top five ads as chosen by the USA Today Super Bowl Ad Meter were:
1. Doritos' fan-made ad about "free Doritos" being seen in a "crystal ball", with different results for two co-workers. Joseph and Dave Herbert from Batesville, Indiana, creators of the ad, won US $1,000,000;
2. Budweiser's Clydesdale love affair with a dancing horse;
3. Another Budweiser ad seeing another Clydesdale playing fetch showing off after the beer wagon's Dalmatian fetches a small stick;
4. A Bridgestone ad with Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head driving in a toy car on a twisty road;
5. Another Doritos ad that shows the power of crunch with a woman being stripped down to her underwear, free money from an ATM and a policeman being turned into a monkey.
USA Today wasn't the only one measuring Super Bowl commercial success.
As one might suspect, Google had their hands in the ad craze as well, with YouTube's AdBlitz. Doesn't ring a bell? Last year, YouTube hosted a special channel dubbed AdBlitz, that offered up online videos of the 2009 Super Bowl commercials with audience members voting on their favorites from the game.
YouTube's top five in "Ad Blitz 2009" saw the two Doritos ads finish first and fifth. The middle three featured E*Trade's Singing Baby ad, CareerBuilder.com's "The Official 2009 Super Bowl Commercial" and Pepsi Max's "I'm Good" finish second through fourth respectively. (Interesting side note: Pepsi will NOT be advertising at the Super Bowl this year according to Mashable.com)
This year, YouTube promises to have videos of the Super Bowl Ads online the minute they air on Feb 7th. The minute after the Super Bowl XLIV ends, voting on the Super Bowl 2010 commercials opens and once again, the world will get to see what brands rocked the nation's socks off.
For 2010, the AdBlitz channel has some exciting new features for even more viewer interaction, including Pomegranate's Twitter-Chat Gadget that will allow for real-time Tweeting on all the Super Bowl and commercial action. Just look for the #youtubeadblitz hash-tag or head on over to YouTube.com/adblitz to get in on the action!
Pomegranate is excited to announce our Video Carousel Gadget that allows Facebook users to watch the videos, and vote for their favorites directly on wall posts. Check back during the Super Bowl to get access to the carousel to vote for your favorite Super Bowl commercial and share with your friends on Facebook!
Now, the real question at hand is... will you be cheering for the Saints, the Colts or the Doritos?
