What’s it like to produce a Super Bowl ad?
I have been involved with the production of three ads and worked with several different clients and ad agency creative directors on the whole question of whether they should spend the money on the biggest TV audience of the year.
The attitudes range from “We gotta go big,” to “let’s just try to have a solid ad as if it was any other time of the year,” to “I’m not paying that kind of money for a TV audience only to have my ad bashed by places like USA Today, Advertising Age, Adweek and Forbes.”
Overall, the game and the ads were pretty ho-hum. A low-scoring game, a lame half-time show with Maroon5 and disappointing creative for the most part.
Cars.com analyzed site traffic to determine which auto ads generated the greatest amount of online car shopping activity during game time. The results? Automakers that aired commercials during the game saw a 384% lift in traffic to their vehicle pages on Cars.com.
Of the automakers that invested in airtime during last night’s game, Hyundai ranked #1 in traffic to Cars.com, followed by Mercedes-Benz and Audi. Within 8 minutes of its commercial airing, visits to Hyundai brand pages on Cars.com saw a 1,831% increase (compared to the same period prior to the airing of its spot).
For purposes of this space, I am ranking just the Top-Five Auto ads for quality and creativity.
Toyota: Grade A+
Toyota had two ads in the big game, and both were very well done, while doing completely different things.
In ad #1 for the Toyota Rav4 Hybrid, the theme is “shattering perceptions.” Despite Toyota selling the Prius and other hybrids for 20 years, many people just don’t understand them. Now, we are getting hybrids in crossovers, a fuel economy game-changer for the most popular category in the U.S.
To tell the story, Toyota focused on the story of Antoinette “Toni” Harris who wants to be the first woman to play in the NFL. She received a scholarship offer from Bethany College, an NAIA school in Kansas. Harris plays free safety for East Los Angeles College in California, will become one of the first female non-kickers on a college football roster.
Shot well and told well, Toyota and its ad agency rang the bell on ad story-telling.
Toyota’s other ad, for the return of the Supra, which the company unveiled at the North American International Auto Show last month, did a nice job of showcasing the sexy looking car in a virtual pinball machine with music from The Who to back it up. Why did this ad score? Because the people in the room with me watching it all said, “Wow! That’s a Toyota?”
Hyundai A
Hyundai used the right approach here. Storytelling. Jason Bateman is the elevator operator (remember those?), plunging passengers into floors with stuff worse than buying a new car–the talk from Dad, jury duty, a vegan dinner party.
Setting aside whether I would alienate vegans, the ad has all the right ingredients for a successful Super Bowl. Everybody knows what is going on. The gags are good. Jason Bateman is likable, though I might have chosen someone less predictable for extra funny factor? Robert DeNiro, Nick Cage?
The ad is for Hyundai’s Assurance program that makes it easier to buy a new car without dickering on price.
https://youtu.be/B5FzKB5TW0Y
Kia A-
Kia chose a real storytelling route with its ad, a story of the people who build its cars in its Georgia plant and the town they come from. It’s not a town of glitz and glamour, but of bake sales, school plays and boys and girl scouts.
I like what Kia was out to do here. Tell a story to a big audience that probably has no idea that Kia builds crossovers in Georgia. And tapping into the nobility of the 99% working-class part of America is a worthy strategy. I also love the indirect (I think) dig at Trump with “There are no stars in the sidewalks for us.” The key line of copy: “We are not known for who we are. We hope to be known for what we do.” I like it.
This plant is making the Kia Telluride crossover.
My only issue is with execution. The ad and story are told by a young lad from the town wearing a cowboy hat. The casting of the kid is questionable. He comes across a little more creepy than inspirational. I’d have liked to see the ad, in the year of the woman, told through a woman of color. It would have been more effective.
https://youtu.be/u_awpNKfjDk
Mercedes-Benz B-
This was a big game for Mercedes-Benz, which is based in Atlanta and holds the naming rights of the new stadium, the home of the Falcons, and host of the 2019 Super Bowl.
The ad they chose to splash with was for the A-Class. The premise is “wouldn’t the world be better if you were listened to?” Our hero in the ad is able to change opera to rap (like rap is really preferable to opera for everyone? I would have nixed it.), get a golf ball on TV to drop in the hole, etc. His wish is the world’s command. The A-Class changes interior light color on command and has a very nice voice-command interface. Okay. I get it. Just not very clever or creative. Feels like better ideas were left on the white-board in the creative war-room.
https://youtu.be/R84j8pmH-d0
Audi C-
Audi. Audi. Audi. What are you doing? You have this amazing new sub-brand, e-tron, for your battery operated vehicles. Not sure why you chose this lame story-line of a guy going home to see his grandfather who seems to be giving his Audi, which turns out to be an e-tron, to him. We find out it is a “dream” that he had, projected into the future while having the Heimlich maneuver performed on him in his office cubicle.
The script is over-written, and requires most people to watch it more than once to totally get it. Plus, too few people know e-tron as a brand for this ad to work at all.
This ad breaks most of the good lessons learned from past Super Bowls about what ads work what ads do not. This ad was a waste of money, and not worthy of where Audi is and where its going.
https://youtu.be/Xrgq2CIag6M
