Super Bowl 50 Archives - American Sweepstakes

Here’s our Super Bowl 50 Wrap Up

Super Bowl 50 is now history. The Denver Broncos won. They beat the Carolina Panthers 24-10. Peyton Manning said throughout Super Bowl week that it has been the Broncos’ “bruise-inflicting, quarterback-rattling defense that got us here, let’s just make that clear.” And he was so right. Cam Newton has finally gotten a slice of humility!

Lady Gaga kicked off the event with the National Anthem and proved to everyone that she really can sing! Beyonce won the halftime show were she also announced her new 2016 Formation World Tour. Fans rushed to her website and temporarily crashed it. The end of the show featured a tribute to past halftime performers including Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston which was pretty cool.

So now for the ads. Advertisers this year paid $5 million for a 30 second Super Bowl Ad. Pepsi and Budweiser where again the big sponsors. Payton Manning gave Budweiser what has been calculated to be $14 million in free advertising when he told a sideline reporter that his postgame plan was to “drink a lot of Budweiser.” Then he mentioned the beer again a few minutes later saying, “what’s weighing on my mind is how soon I can get a Bud Light in my mouth.” In other words, don’t ask me again if I’m retiring!

For the last ever Doritos “Crash the Super Bowl” contest Doritos chose to show two ads at Super Bowl 50, rather than picking one winner. “Ultrasound” by Peter Carstairs and “Doritos Dogs” by Jacob Chase were both aired. However “Doritos Dogs” was named the official winner. I stated in a previous post that I wrote about this contest that I am a sucker for any video with dogs! The winner received $1 million and a real jump start to his film making career. Doritos announced that even though this 10 year contest has come to an end it’s only the beginning. Meet the Doritos “Legion of the Bold” campaign. More to come on this.

This was definitely the year that many celebrities got in on the action. Amy Schumer and Seth Rogen for the Bud Light Party, Ryan Reynolds was “what a man” for Hyundai and Steve Harvey, who is now famous for his Miss Universe mistake, apologized again for T-Mobile. Drake and a trio of suits managed to make an overplayed song the center of a very funny joke in T-Mobile’s Super Bowl ad. Aerosmith rocker Steven Tyler commissioned a portrait of himself made entirely of Skittles. Abby Wambach, Serena Williams and professional skateboarder and actor Tony Hawk defied labels for Mini Cooper. Christopher Walken saved a man from a lifetime of beige socks in this Super Bowl ad for Kia. One of my favorite was Helen Mirren promoting the #GiveADamn movement against drunk driving for Budweiser.

Some of my other favorites were Audi’s surprisingly emotional “Commander” that snapped an aging astronaut out of his depression and included the late David Bowie’s “Starman” as the soundtrack. The Heinz “Wiener Stampede” was so cute that included a bunch of wiener dogs in hot dog suits running in slow motion into the arms of people dressed as ketchup and mustard. Again, it’s a dog thing with me. Also, of course, is Subara’s “Dog Approved” ad that featured a golden retriever (I have a golden retriever) who is driving around in her Subaru and checks the rear view mirror where we see a puppy strapped into a car seat in the back. I love dogs doing people things, like the Dorito’s ad as well. But one ad that I laughed out load to was Honda’s new truck ad featuring sheep singing Queen’s “Somebody to Love”. It was something about those sheep and the song together.

I’ve read many different articles about all the Super Bowl ads and there was not a one ad that really stood out, like Budweiser’s lost puppy last year. But I found most entertaining. Mountain Dew’s puppy-monkey-baby that they created for their new Kickstart product I thought was pretty weird. But again, I’m not their target market.

Esurance’s ran a 30-second pregame ad and then a 1st quarter Super Bowl ad that promoted their Pass It On Sweepstakes offering a chance to win up to $1 million in exchange for tweeting #Esurancesweepstakes. This generated huge Twitter chatter. According to data from tech company Spredfast, the brand’s Twitter mentions spiked at 6:35 p.m. when the commercial aired, generating 9,000 tweets per minute. The hashtag also trended nationally on Twitter for roughly 15 minutes. As a whole this year, hashtags were in 45% of Super Bowl 50 ads, slightly down from 50% last year.

So that’s my wrap-up of Super Bowl 50 and all the ads and promotions that were associated with it. I hope you enjoyed my posts. We will now go through football withdrawal and dream that maybe our team will make it next year!

What do you think will be this year’s best Super Bowl ad?

This Sunday the Carolina Panthers and the Denver Broncos will compete in Super Bowl 50 to be held in Santa Clara in Levi’s Stadium. I am eagerly awaiting the game which I’ll be watching from our living room couch. Check out this Panthers vs. Broncos Super Bowl trailer that the NFL recently posted.

The battle over this year’s Super Bowl ads has been heating up, in fact there was even a “Super Bowl’s Greatest Commercials” show that was broadcasted on CBS on Tuesday evening. CBS invited people to vote for their favorite, all-time Super Bowl ad. The winner was Budweiser with their ‘Clydesdales Brotherhood’ ad that aired in 2013 as the Ravens beat out the 49ers. The ad also included Stevie Nicks singing Landslide. So that helped to really strike an emotional chord with many of us viewers

Budweiser has already stated that they won’t be airing any puppy ads this year, which was last year’s favorite ad, but that the Clydesdales will definitely be back. The brand’s sister, Bud Light, has been named as this year’s winner so far when it comes to digital chatter ever since they released a Super Bowl teaser ad featuring comedians Amy Schumer and Seth Rogan. The two are getting ready for their Bud Light Party, and just in time for the Iowa Caucuses, “party” apparently is a play on political parties.

Budweiser gets serious in this ad which teams up with Helen Mirren to promote the #GiveADamn movement against drunk driving. Mirren says “People who still drive drunk are, simply put, a utterly useless, oxygen wasting, human form of pollution….so stop it”. She ends with taking a sip of her bottle of bud with her burger and fries.

Avocados From Mexico decided to advertise during the game for the first time last year and they’re back for a second year. “A lot of the stress around ‘Is the Super Bowl right for us?’ That’s gone,” said Jay Russell, chief creative officer of GSD&M, the ad agency behind both commercials for Avocados From Mexico. But, he added, “In a weird way, it’s more stressful because you have to come back.” The brand recently released this year’s ad which is called AVOS in Space and featured here.

eMarketer released some stats this week that shows that viewers still like Super Bowl ads. They stated that according to the National Retail Federation, last year, 77.1% of consumers surveyed considered Super Bowl ads a form of entertainment. A tiny portion, just 4.5%, said the ads bothered them. Even though people are generally not annoyed by these commercials that doesn’t mean they’re necessarily giving them 100% of their attention either. According to a PricewaterhouseCoopers, 2015 survey, 11.2% of respondents said they always use a mobile device while watching TV in general. And 23.7% said they sometimes do so.

Some of this time that people are spending on their phones during the Super Bowl will be spent engaging with social media which they often share comments about the game and the commercials.“The Super Bowl drives an incredible amount of social media commentary and interaction,” says eMarketer principal analyst Debra Aho Williamson. “Advertisers want to be where their audience is, and that’s in social media. Last year, 65 million people worldwide used Facebook to talk about the game while it was happening, according to the company.”

So are you ready for some football? Between watching these two great teams, with two great quarterbacks, along with the Coldplay and guests halftime show, it should be pretty entertaining. Plus just announced today, Lady Gaga will help kick of the excitement by singing the national anthem. Oh and don’t forget about the ads. I’ll be back next week with a recap to end my annual Super Bowl coverage.

Super Bowl 50: A quick peak at some of this year’s ads

We got to see some great football last Sunday and watch two teams move on to Super Bowl 50. Payton Manning of the Denver Broncos vs. Tom Brady of the New England Patriots played the first game. However, the Patriots offense just didn’t really show up and Brady was sacked over 20 times. The final score was close, but the Broncos defense really dominated the game and ended up with the “W”. Today it was announced that the Patriots fired their offensive line coach, Dave DeGuglielmo. It was also leaked today that Payton Manning at the end of the game hinted to Bill Belichick, Patriots’ head coach, that he may be retiring.

The next game with Cam Newton and the Panthers really wasn’t much of a game. They defeated the Arizona Cardinals 49-15. So now we have the older, more experienced quarterback, Payton Manning, to play against the young and unstoppable quarterback, Cam Newton, in Super Bowl 50. Let’s hope it’s a good game since the hype is already in full swing.

This year, CBS is charging as much as $5 million for a 30 second Super Bowl ad. Last year, NBC celebrated when approximately 114.4 million people tuned into the 2015 Super Bowl to watch the Seattle Seahawks play the Patriots, making the game the most-watched broadcast in the history of U.S. television. So those that shelled out $4.5 million for a 30 second spot had a win as well. Plus, Katy Perry and her dancing costumed sharks pulled in 118.5 million viewers making it the most watched halftime show in the Super Bowl’s 49 year history.

So what will we see with this year’s ads? Budweiser, one of the game’s main sponsors, already stated that they won’t be back this year with another adorable puppy ad. Last year’s Lost Puppy ad was voted the most favorite of all the spots. Animal lovers need not despair, however, because the beautiful Budweiser Clydesdales will still grace our screens on Super Bowl Sunday. According to Jorn Socquet, U.S. VP of Marketing for Anheuser-Busch, “the Clydesdales are icons of the brand and will most certainly make an appearance.” The puppy ads just don’t sell beer!

Bud Light will be airing a spot featuring Amy Schumer and Seth Rogen who will appear as Bud Light bottle buddies. We’ll be seeing many other famous actors and other stars such as comedic actor T.J. Miller who will star in an ad for Shock Top beer–a spot which he’s recently teased to be the “greatest Super Bowl commercial of all time.” Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler will be “walking this way” for Skittles and website creator Squarespace has hired comic duo Key and Peele. Liam Neeson will be supporting LG Electronics while Christopher Walken will be backing up KIA.

My hometown, Rochester native and soccer star Abby Wambach is expected to make a big splash with her appearance in a new BMW, Mini Cooper ad. The commercial, “Defy Labels,” will launch a six-month long campaign and is meant to help the public look past the “small” and “cute” labels with which the Mini is usually associated. Tennis star Serena Williams and professional skateboarder and actor Tony Hawk will also be featured in two other “Defy Labels” spots. Here’s a look at Abby’s teaser ad:

Super Bowl 50’s half-time show is also expected to be a big hit. Some halftime performers who have performed on the stage of the game previously, Beyoncé and Bruno Mars, are both expected to join Coldplay for the halftime show. “Are you kidding me? It’s the greatest moment of our band’s life. We’re going to give it everything we have,” Coldplay frontman Chris Martin promised in a video interview promoting the show.

So stayed tuned next week for some additional coverage of Super Bowl 50 Advertising and Promotions!

Doritos Crash the Super Bowl Video Contest Final Edition

We had a bit of NFL history in last weekend’s wild-card round. For the first time all four road teams won in the same playoff weekend. All those hometown fans in Washington D.C., Minneapolis, Cincinnati and Houston were disappointed to see their team’s season end. The fans of the Cincinnati Bengals and the Minnesota Vikings thought they had the game in the bag, but fans of both teams had a heartbreaking loss and Vikings fans sat through a bitter cold, minus degrees, game.

So this weekend the Road to Super Bowl 50 continues with 8 teams moving on. Saturday we have the Chiefs at the Patriots first and then the Packers at the Cardinals. On Sunday we get to watch the Seahawks at the Panthers and then the Steelers at the Broncos. So I highly doubt we’ll see a repeat of all road teams winning in the same weekend.

PepsiCo, the parent company of Doritos, is back again for their Annual Crash the Super Bowl Video Contest which is their 10th season. They announced that this will be the last edition of the contest and now my last time writing about it on this blog which I’ve done since 2008.

This year just three finalists videos were chosen which are now posted on the contest website. The public is invited to vote once per day, per device up till Jan. 28.

This year’s contestants have the chance to win $1 million and the opportunity to work with Zack Snyder, director of 300 and Man of Steel, whose latest film, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, will be released next March. The winner will work with Snyder as well as Warner Brothers and DC Comics on an undisclosed future project.

“We’re giving consumers one last shot to make their mark and see their homemade ads air during the Super Bowl broadcast,” Jeff Klein, vice president of marketing at Frito-Lay, said in a statement. “This is truly last call for all of those who not only want a shot at $1 million—but want a chance to jump-start their career in Hollywood.” The winning ad will air during CBS’ Super Bowl 50 telecast on Feb. 7. One Grand Prize winner and the two First Prize winners will all receive a trip to attend Super Bowl 50 and view the game from the Doritos suite.

May the best ad win. I’m always a sucker for any video with dogs. Here on the contest website you can view all the fan ads that have won and aired during the Super Bowl.

Sweepstakes offer chances to win tickets to Super Bowl 50

I hope everyone enjoyed their holidays and Happy New Year. Now that we are into January, as my blogging tradition conditions, I’m going to focus on the football playoff season and the Super Bowl. I will be covering some of the ads and promotional campaigns associated with Super Bowl 50. This year Super Bowl 50 will be hosted on February 7, in the City of Santa Clara at the state-of-the-art Levi’s Stadium, which the bay area hosts claim is the greenest and most technologically advanced professional football stadium in the United States.

Here’s what this year’s playoff picture looks like this year:

If you have been a reader of this blog, you would know that I’m a Buffalo Bills fan and writing about another playoff season that they didn’t make. It was the first year with Rex Ryan as the coach, who promised that we’d make it and then had to eat his words. But on the bright side, it appears we have found a quarterback in Tyrod Taylor and he and Sammy Watkins really connected in the last game of the season in which they ended the Jets playoff hopes.

The Super Bowl has been one of the most watched sporting events and continues to have an enormous amount of marketing associated with it. NBC’s broadcast of last year’s Super Bowl was the most watched program in American television history, surpassing the previous year’s game. So we’ll see if we break that record again.

Last year most of the advertisers followed the trend of the previous year and released their TV spots prior to the actual broadcast of the game. So we expect to see more of that this year. For now here are a few of promotions that are currently still offering a chance to win ticket packages to the game.

SiriusXM’s Super Bowl 50 Sweepstakes is giving their current subscribers a chance to win an opportunity to go to Super Bowl 50. One Grand prize winner will receive round-trip airfare for two to San Francisco, CA, three nights hotel stay and two tickets to Super Bowl 50. This sweepstakes ends on January 25.

Campbell’s Chunky Super Bowl 50 Instant Win Game is giving away ten Grand Prizes that include a 3 night trip for each winner and guest to Super Bowl 50, round trip air transportation, hotel accommodations, a travel stipend for ground transportation, 2 tickets to the game, 2 Super Bowl 50 Gift Bags and $250 spending money. Participants are invited to purchase specialty-marked cans of Campbell’s Chunky soups and look under the lid to see if they are a winner. A no purchase entry is also included on the promotional website.

We are assisting a client with The Shocase Special Teams Sweepstakes which is offering participants a chance to win 2 tickets to Super Bowl 50 along with hotel accommodations. We again are using the Shortstack platform to host the promotional entry form. Shocase’s objective is to create awareness of their professional network for marketers and gain new members.

So what teams will make it to this year’s Super Bowl? Will we see the return of the New England Patriots, or will it be the Denver Broncos who will battle it out with Cam Newton and the Carolina Panthers? Or will one of the wild card teams, such as Seattle or Pittsburgh, continue their recent hot streaks and win a division title. We’ll know more after this weekend. Stay tuned for more coverage as the road to the Super Bowl continues.