The advertisers, which are spending up to $3 million for each 30-second commercial during Super Bowl XLIII, have a tricky task before them. They must figure out the right way to speak to consumers worried about the wretched economy while at the same time not ignore the long-standing appeal of Super Bowl Sunday as a night of escapist fare.
“Advertisers have to strike a delicate balance this year,” said Tim Calkins, a marketing professor at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.
“They need to recognize the environment we’re in,” Mr. Calkins said, “so they don’t want to appear too flip, making light of a tough situation.”
“But the people who watch the Super Bowl, they still want to be entertained,” he added.
Mr. Calkins likened the challenge the advertisers face to the situation that confronts a political candidate in tough times. “You don’t want to seem tone-deaf,” he said, “but you don’t get elected telling people how bad things are.”
Previews of some of the commercials that NBC plans to run nationally during the game suggest that advertisers and the agencies creating the spots are tip-toeing along the tightrope.
For instance, at least two advertisers — the Denny’s restaurant chain and the Universal resort in Orlando, Fla. — intend to run commercials meant to appeal to thrift-minded consumers; the ads will end with special offers.
Such promotions are highly unusual for a Super Bowl, where marketers typically run spots that burnish corporate images or ask consumers to buy products at regular prices. One exception was a commercial that ran during halftime of the 1975 Super Bowl in which Joe Garagiola introduced rebates on Chrysler cars with a “Buy a car, get a check” promotion.
“We think this offer will create a lot of excitement,” said Kurt Kostur, senior vice president for marketing at the Universal Orlando Resort, part of the NBC Universal division of General Electric, and “strike a chord with today’s families.”
Mr. Kostur declined to describe the promotion because, he said, “we’re saving it to reveal within the Super Bowl.”
But it makes sense despite the challenge the economy presents, he added, in that the offer is meant to evoke “the time you felt you could be anyone, do anything.” The Universal Orlando Resort commercial was created by David and Goliath, an agency in El Segundo, Calif.
Likewise, Denny’s is mum on details about the promotion planned for its first Super Bowl spot ever, created by Goodby, Silverstein & Partners in San Francisco, part of the Omnicom Group. Executives, however, say the offer involves the restaurant chain’s Grand Slam breakfast.
“It’s above and beyond a coupon,” said Mark Chmiel, chief marketing officer at Denny’s in Spartanburg, S.C., who said the promotion was a response to the slowdown in meals eaten in restaurants since the recession began.
“We have seen evidence that 40 to 50 percent of people are dining out less often,” Mr. Chmiel said. “What they’re looking for is something that really resonates with them and offers real value.”
•
In another sign of the (troubled) times, Cash4Gold, a company that pays money for jewelry and other valuables, is buying commercial time for the Super Bowl that might be the first spot in the game from what is known as a direct-response advertiser.
The buy, reported on Thursday by USA Today, raised eyebrows among some who follow the advertising industry, wondering whether the recession was reducing demand for Super Bowl spots among mainstay brands.
“The Super Bowl advertising ranks are usually filled with the big boys of marketing: Anheuser-Busch, Coca-Cola, PepsiCo,” an article on the Web site of the trade publication Advertising Age began. “And now: Cash4Gold?”
A spokesman for the NBC Sports unit of NBC, which is overseeing ad sales for Super Bowl XLIII, demurred.
“The Super Bowl obviously is the best way to reach a mass audience,” said the spokesman, Brian Walker, and Cash4Gold “saw value in it for their business needs, much in the way the Pepsis and Anheuser-Busches did.”
Even so, Cash4Gold is not running one of its regular commercials, which specialize in hard-sell tactics like repetition of a toll-free telephone number.
Rather, the company worked with two mainstream agencies to create a humorous spot — with a Web address (Cash4Gold.com) in place of the toll-free number — that would not seem out of place with Super Bowl spiels from blue-chip brands like Pepsi-Cola or Bud Light.
“We definitely wanted to do a commercial with a creative concept worthy of the Super Bowl,” said Steve Netzley, chief executive at Euro RSCG Edge in Carlsbad, Calif., part of the Euro RSCG Worldwide division of Havas. His agency worked on the spot with another Havas agency, Arnold Worldwide, and a director, Bryan Buckley, who has directed Super Bowl spots for advertisers like E*Trade and Monster.com.
The Cash4Gold commercial features Ed McMahon and the rapper MC Hammer in a can-you-top-this competition to sell gold memorabilia and other valuables through Cash4Gold.com. The spot even borrows a page from the Super Bowl ad playbook of major marketers by ending with a mildly naughty punch line.
“We absolutely changed up everything for the Super Bowl,” said Jeff Aronson, chief executive at Cash4Gold in Pompano Beach, Fla., part of Albar Precious Metal Refining, to help the company reach more consumers who may be receptive to its message as a result of the bad economy.
To be sure, many Super Bowl advertisers intend to run commercials looking just like those that have appeared during boom times. Many spots on Sunday will be filled with Super Bowl ad staples like celebrities, special effects, anthropomorphic animals and surprise endings.
“It’s a conundrum,” said Gary Carr, senior vice president for national broadcast at a New York media agency, TargetCast TCM.
“Some boards of directors are saying, ‘Let’s not do something so high-profile’ like advertise on the Super Bowl,” Mr. Carr said, yet “the world hasn’t come to an end and people still have to sell beer and cars.”
“Companies have to look inside their hearts and minds and do what they feel is right,” he added.
No comments:
Post a Comment