Super Bowl ads prove laughter sells
Advertisers gravitate toward humor and celebrity cameos on TV's biggest night.
Published Feb. 6, 2007
It sounds like the beginning of a joke, a "who's who" of pop culture punch lines.
Janet Reno, Martha Stewart and David Beckham attend a party hosted by controversial Cincinnati Bengals wide receiver Chad Johnson.
Janet Reno provides commentary for the game while Martha chastises NFL players for buying cumin instead of cilantro.
This advertisement for the NFL Network expresses the direction advertisers took with Super Bowl commercials this year, often using humor or celebrity cameos.
Some celebrity appearances fell short, including a Chevrolet ad where rapper T.I. and other musicians gave uninspired, cheesy vocal performances paying tribute to their cars. But comedians fared much better: Jim Gaffigan's "beard comb-over" bit and a Bud Light commercial featuring comedian Carlos Mencia were two of the night's most well-received.
Stephen Kopcha, an associate professor of strategic communication in the School of Journalism, noted humor has become the main marketing strategy used in Super Bowl advertising.
"The biggest change is the introduction and escalation of crude humor," Kopcha said. "Another thing that has changed over time, advertisers used to feel that they had better do a good selling job since the airtime was so expensive. Now, a lot of them seem content to make people laugh."
Sophomore Marissa Sharkey, a strategic communication major, agreed humor was essential in the commercials. Sharkey is also a former reporter for The Maneater.
"Humor is always appealing," Sharkey said. "And it was tasteful humor while at the same time appealing to the audience they were marketing to, in this case drunken football lovers."
Margaret Duffy, MU's strategic communication chairwoman and a graduate professor in media and advertising, said the new trend of consumer-created commercials could change the face of advertising in the long run.
"From a professional and research standpoint, the user-created commercials, such as Doritos, are another sign of changes in the advertising world," she said.
Kopcha said though creativity abounds here, the main focus — the need to sell a product — often gets lost in the commercials.
"The first duty of a Super Bowl commercial is to get noticed," Kopcha said. "Unfortunately, that's all some of them do. But the overriding purpose of the commercial is to do a selling job after you've got the audience's attention. More each year are forgetting to sell the product."
Duffy said the most successful commercials are the ones that attempt to market a memorable scenario or image to the brand itself.
"They usually try to grab attention through humor that connects to the brand in some way," she said. "Budweiser has always been good at this. This year's 'Spot' commercial is an example."
Kopcha also praised the Budweiser ad, featuring a dog that tries to gain the right to ride on the Budweiser beer cart. As a former advertising executive who helped make commercials for companies including Anheuser-Busch, he has an appreciation for the combination of innovation and tradition featured in their Clydesdale ads.
"I made a lot of commercials with the Clydesdales, and I love them," Kopcha said. "They are a great symbol of pride and tradition, and they just make people smile and feel good. Those are good things for beer."
Although some companies have done well with consistently solid formulas for ads, often based on a tradition such as the Budweiser Clydesdales, many are having issues with finding new ways to market to a consistently changing demographic, a warning Duffy gives to students who plan to pursue the advertising track.
"It's become more expensive and riskier," Duffy said. "It's about the last remaining venue that gathers a mass audience."
Both Kopcha and Duffy said students — especially those who plan to pursue a career in the advertising field — could learn from watching commercials during the Super Bowl.
"Students should watch the game to see what's happening in the ad world," Kopcha said. "In one evening, you can see where the current industry mind-set is. That comes in handy when you're thinking of entering the business in a year or so. However, they need to keep in mind that styles of advertising, like fashions in clothing change."
Duffy said it is important for students to acquire a sense of cultural literacy in order to keep up with changing demographics.
"To be successful in this business, you must be tuned in to what's happening in all aspects of culture-popular trends, celebrities, technology, music, the arts and so on," she said.
Sharkey said she learned a lot about how to advertise to an audience from watching the Super Bowl.
"(I gained) ideas and strategies that I would have never thought of," she said. "I never would have thought to have old men dancing around a car in their underwear."