The Commercial Bowl: Which Campaign Will Prove To Be The Most Strategic?

One reason for the lack of excitement could be that the media coverage this year revealed too much of a sneak peek and viewers already knew what was coming.

One thing is for sure; millions of people tuned in to watch.  In fact, 151.6 million people tuned in to watch at least part of the game, setting the stage for massive exposure for companies. 

The focus this year was the 360-marketing campaign, in which companies used social media to reinforce their commercial advertisements. 

While many people in the online community have criticized the commercials this year, it begs the question: can companies do without the $2 to $3 million spent on 30-second spots?

Pepsi pulled out after 23 years of advertisements during the Super Bowl to focus on social media.  Could they possibly be on to something?

They are the first company to focus their marketing campaign solely on social media, with the launch of The Pepsi Refresh Project in January.

The online community responded to the commercials by tweeting and blogging their reactions.  The graph below illustrates the companies that were spoken about the most, a day after the Super Bowl. (using Radian 6 numbers as of 3 p.m. Monday)

This is a snippet of which companies are receiving the most buzz a day after the Super Bowl, with Doritos and Google receiving the most attention. 

The Brandbowl, a web site created by Mullen and Radian 6 to monitor the Twittersphere for ad popularity, reinforces the findings above.

After 98,656 tweets, Doritos and Google were top scorers, which means both companies dominated in volume of tweets.

But while both of those companies were the most tweeted, the Pepsi campaign may turn out to be the most strategic, with the company choosing to create the Pepsi Refresh Project, which donates thousands of dollars to great ideas submitted through its web site and Facebook.  The campaign is sure to keep people talking long after the advertisements from last night fades away.

While the graph shows that Coca-Cola beat out Pepsi in buzz generated from their commercial, it will be interesting to see how many people are still speaking about Coca-Cola’s commercials weeks from now compared to how many are still speaking about the social media campaign that Pepsi has developed.  

Each company that had a commercial during the Super Bowl used social media in some capacity in their marketing campaign.  Twitter seems to be the most popular tool as it was used to engage viewers both before and after the commercials aired.

But when the buzz from the Super Bowl commercials end, the Pepsi Refresh Project will still be generating excitement.  Can we say the same about any other company that spent millions of dollars on a commercial this passed Sunday? 

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