Super Bowl Ads Bring Consumer Insights Home
The 4-Hour Focus Group Inhaling its Weight in Guacamole
Super Bowl Sunday is a strong and accessible real-time case study. Half of us watch for the game itself, and half for the ads. Yet, we keep the TV volume turned-up through the game, the ads, and the halftime show. This never-mute-it dynamic gifts you an afternoon of consumer insights right there in your family room.
Scan your Super Bowl party guests as the programming changes from football to ads and back. You’ll notice Segment A: the Football Audience lean in when the game is live, while Segment B: the Ads Audience checks out to talk, tweet, or turn to a crowd-favorite at the grazing table. (Caprese Crostini is a winner — unless you invited the corndog crowd... )
Predictably enough, the Football Audience sees commercial breaks as cues to turn away for a fresh drink or a run at the snacks. (OK, OK... serve Cornbread Poppers if you must, but at least buy the good mustard.)
Meanwhile, the Ads Audience dials up its focus for the $10million/minute Google 'Loretta' love story, 'Spongebob’ movie tailer, and of course 'The Avocados From Mexico Shopping Network' (don’t forget to quadruple-batch a metric ton of fresh guac!)
Start With Audience & What’s in it for Them
Throughout your Super Bowl Sunday audience analysis, you’ll notice the Football Audience consistently more focused on the game itself, and the Ads Audience more focused on the commercial breaks.
I won’t bog you down with the depth of my grad school research here, but long story short:
- Our human nature to generalize is a cognitive drive for efficiency — seeking shortcuts in our thought processes.
- Because we trust people more than we trust brands or governments, there’s an increasingly intentional resistance to institutional messaging.
- We’re into a third generation that's able to subconsciously clock advertising. We see a sales agenda from a mile away, and check-in or check-out at will.
Add a second screen on-hand constantly, and your iPhone strengthens this selective engagement. Pile on the majority of our waking hours saturated with competing content.
Increasingly, we don't need to mute the car radio for ads — we check out and talk over them until the music starts again. We don't need to mute the TV as programming shifts to football or Super Bowl ads. Instead, we manage that engagement with our ever-stronger subliminal ability to filter content with our minds.
It isn’t new tech itself that changes the world — TV, web, or smartphones. It’s our new behaviors in adopting and adapting to those technologies that change our engagement with the world. Your Super Bowl Sunday guests are bound to highlight this dynamic, just watch.
Sell 'em What They Want; Give 'em What They Need
More often than not, the more successful approach is to start with audience-focused questions aiming to give people what they want — Operative term: They.
Through consumer insights, engagement metrics and gap analysis, stop telling and start asking:
- Who is the audience for this messaging?
- Where do they engage with our brand?
- What do they (not you) want from this content?
- What's in it for them?
Maintain this mindset, not just in Meeting 1, but throughout content creation, delivery, and measurement:
- Where to begin? Always start with audience.
- Which channel? Meet 'em where they are.
- Brand content strategy: Data-driven > ego-driven.
- Audience engagement key: We > me.
You're bound to see stronger results and develop actionable understanding toward scalable, sustainable engagement. Make every day your Super Bowl of audience analysis. Cheers!
Charles Dye has written for and worked in brand creative & content strategy with Nike, Oracle, Livestrong.com, AZCentral Fitness, and newsrooms across the US. Commercial & non-profit inquiries welcome - [email protected]