Doritos Grabs Early Lead in Consumer-Generated Super Bowl Ads
Written by Brenda Aulinskis (contact - e-mail) -- January 31st, 2007 | Recommend ThisWhen I think of the Super Bowl I think of three things – pigs in a blanket, $5.00 squares, and big-budget TV ads. And while many eyes are on what Bob Parsons is go-daddy go-ing to do this year, I am most fascinated by the new consumer-generated campaigns from Doritos, Chevrolet and the NFL itself. These new campaigns are turning over the advertising reigns to consumers; I can’t help but wonder whether marketers are tapping into the wisdom of the crowds, or are simply hoping that consumers can succeed where their agencies could not.
The three companies have taken notably different approaches, with each strategy yielding different outcomes. Here are my early reviews of each campaign:
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• The NFL’s “Best Super Bowl Commercial Ever. Seriously.” promotion attracted only 2% of the 5 million people who visited NFL.com in the first two weeks of January. Gino’s audition is great, but the NFL left the audience on the table on this one. Seriously.
• Doritos’ all-online “Crash the Super Bowl” contest encouraged consumers to produce, submit, and vote on their favorite spots. More than 125,000 people visited the site during the first two weeks of January, 10 times as many people than visited Doritos.com. Kudos to Doritos, this promotion sets the standard for how to get the most out of Super Bowl spending.
• The “Chevy Super Bowl College Ad Challenge” just launched, but the early signs are that online interest in the promotion is lagging. Virtually no one in our consumer panel has visited the CBS or Chevy micro-sites thus far in January. Without an online community surrounding the promotion, it will be hard for Chevy to match Doritos.
So Doritos is the clear pre-game winner thus far. Perhaps Doritos has cracked the code on how to use consumer-generated commercials to stay strong amongst all the ad hype by having regular people snack strong on their self-made commercials and, hopefully, their chips. Stay tuned for our post-game report on Super Bowl advertising where we will report on consumers’ favorite ads and which sites garnered the most attention following the big game.
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February 1st, 2007 at 12:00 pm
This is good, tough talk for a tough sport in a tough business.
But here’s the real question - do Chevy & Doritos really know the levels of awareness they targeted or is it “we’ll take anything we get and still sell the product for the same price in the same package”? There’s hype and there’s accoutability for spending ad $ - what matters more? I see more encouragement on the former.
February 1st, 2007 at 7:11 pm
Fact… 95% of commercials suck. When you make a commercial you, independant of the actual ad spot, you pay a truck load for an agency, actors, production, etc… This is the wave of the future. The advertising world will fight it. The survivors will be those who adopt the 2.0 model… the losers will be everyone else… especially the makers of “you gelling?”. I want to kill myself everytime I see those spots.
February 1st, 2007 at 9:34 pm
Not as bad as Orville Reddenbacher reborn!
February 2nd, 2007 at 11:22 am
If corporations really want to make consumers happy, they should forego costly Super Bowl ads and instead invest in a Chief Customer Officer, a single person of power charged with putting him or herself in the customers’ mind.
But instead they spend their time and money making sure their ad is funny and entertaining, which doesn’t mean it sells more products. A good marketer surprises consumers by giving them new ideas on how and why to use a particular product. Ads developed by typical people or starring famous celebrities may get laughs, but are unlikely to generate sales. For every dollar you spend you should be seeing a dollar back and I sincerely doubt that these companies are generating an additional $2.6 million due to these Super Bowl ads.
Marketers need to stop thinking that marketing HAS to be creative. It HAS to sell goods and services. Sometimes the least creative marketing is the most effective.
Mark Stevens
CEO of MSCO
http://www.msco.com/blog
February 7th, 2007 at 1:01 pm
Interesting…
I think the products are so different that it makes it hard to predict the final outcome of the score. To buy a Chevy most consumers seek multiple inputs such as other manufacturer’s products, lending institutions for available finance and lease options, and input from their friends, neighbors and family. If a comsumer is in the mood for a bag of Doritos they just buy them and gobble them up without too much remorse until they weigh in at weight watchers.
It is scary to think of the dollars spent on Superbowl ads and see some of the results, but it does make for good thought provoking conversation.
May 9th, 2008 at 3:52 am
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