Being that we’re a unified marketing agency, it only seems right that we give our take on the Super Bowl ads that aired last night, so here’s our collective montage of the Definition 6 opinions.
Our special thanks to Def6 participants: Asa Sherrill, Creative Director; Ashley Reed, Social Media Manager; Chris Wojda, Senior Brand Planner; Frank Radice, Expert In Residence; Jeff Katz, President & COO; Michael Johnson, Account Executive; Paul Hernacki, Chief Technology Officer; Ryan Kantor, Marketing Intern; Chris Thornton, CMO; and Charlie Eisenhardt, Senior Editor.
Get ready for our list of touchdowns, incomplete plays, penalty flags and halftime show reviews (we had to throw in SOME football references!)
Enjoy and please comment with your own thoughts. Oh, and you may want to check out AdAge.com's list of Superbowl ads so you can follow along.
Some of our Favorites…because they were humorous, well-produced and made a lasting impact on us:
“The best overall spots were the Fox promos...especially for 'House, MD,' 'X-Factor,' and 'Glee' (the Chevy product placement was fantastic!)”
“Good showing by Verizon, Motorola, BestBuy.”
“I liked the Kia ad. Where I was, everyone was guessing what brand it was promoting as it was running and BMW was blurted out. I thought it was a sharp looking car, and I’ll keep it in mind when I need a new car.”
“Helmets off to the NFL commercial during the Super Bowl! Of course, it had star power and humor from The Brady Bunch to Modern Family but 'Best Fans Ever' was exactly what Roger Goodell and the NFL needed.”
“I loved the Careerbuilder.com ad and the Coca-Cola ‘Siege’ one.”
“Favorite lines of the night from BestBuy's ad with Ozzy Osborne: ‘How many G’s are there?’ and ‘What’s a Beiber?’ Nicely done.”
"VW 'The Force' was awesome. Glad they released the :60 earlier though. Liked it better than the :30."
Missed tackles…for not enough brand identity, not funny, or just plain blah:
On Doritos, “The Best Part” (aka the finger-licker) – “Strange and disturbing. Funny concept, but poorly executed.”
“The Snickers ‘new’ Betty White - Richard Lewis and Roseanne Barr – were funny yet the concept was the same as last year. They missed the mark.”
“Also disappointing were the Bud ads ‘Wild West’ and ‘Product Placement’.”
Def6’s Superbowl MVP ad:
You guessed it - the 2 minute Chrysler “Imported from Detroit” ad featuring Eminem. It does pose the question though – does longer viewing time contribute to the success of this spot? There was a lot of controversy last week leading up to this, but we feel that it was well-produced, and evoked emotional connections with the viewers. I guess the real question becomes – was it worth $8 million?
“This broke the car commercial mold and presented the heart and soul of Detroit! Normally I think using celebrities in commercials is gratuitous and unnecessary, but (the brand of) Eminem represents this feeling of Detroit. Chrysler & Fallon, great work making me care about American cars again.”
“Chrysler ad was truly awesome. I’m from Detroit. Had me misty eyed and wanting to buy a 200, feeling dirty for owning an Altima.”
“The best part of the whole night was the Chrysler tagline (the ad was very good, the tagline was great) ’Imported From Detroit.’ The insight into how removed most of the country has become from the Motor City is extremely powerful. I just hope the products can deliver. That said, BMW's designed and made in America messaging was equally great.”
Gross-out Factor Winner - VW “Beetle”:
“I personally HATED the VW Beetle – had to close my eyes. I’m a huge bug-aphobe.”
On the sidelines, but still worth talking about:
"The Teleflora ad with Faith Hill totally caught me off guard. It was one of those 'wow, did they really just say that' moments."
"The worst part of the whole night (in regards to brands) is Christina Aguilera's personal brand. Talk about a negative brand experience that she will forever be remembered for. Ouch!"
Half-Time Review
The Black Eyed Peas performance – exciting, hip and trendy or simply played out?
I really don’t want to get too down on this performance since it seemed that the NFL and FOX wanted to bring currently trendy music bands back into this widely viewed performance as opposed to the safer rock bands we’ve seen over the last few years (thanks Janet).
The most interesting thing we’ve found is that it definitely evoked an emotion – you either loved it or hated it.
“I thought it was awesome to see such a show – I was even dancing and fist-pumping along in my living room!”
“Terrible performance – not sure what you’re doing on that stage if you can’t hit your notes, but the lite-brite suits and choreography were killer!”
"My son just asked me if this was 'Tron: The Musical'."
“I heard they could have gotten the Foo Fighters, but chose the Black Eyed Peas instead. What a terrible call! The Black Eyed Peas are a generally over-edited band so it's no surprise they can’t hit notes live. I enjoyed watching all the middle aged people at the Super Bowl party stare in disgust though. Slash from Guns ‘n Roses was the highlight for me. Not sure why Usher showed up, just to lip sync.”
“I thought the half time show was lame. While The Black Eyed Peas are a great group, the production value of the broadcast seemed too tame, even dull, and therefore the energy and excitement of their live performance was hard to embrace. Watching the half time show I thought back about prior performances – the explosive energy of The Who which no medium can contain, and of course the shocking publicity stunt by Janet Jackson. I wondered, do live half time performances also need a 'gimmick' to break through the clutter of viewers’ expectations of what constitutes Super Bowl entertainment? Much like the Super Bowl TV commercials, live half time shows may need more than Slash and his amazing guitar playing to break through the history of torn bras, mad rockers and fireworks that viewers have come to expect.”
“Yeah, on Facebook the consensus about the Half Time show was collective yawn. Comments I read made fun of the fact that the BEP's phoned it in as they usually do and the bells & whistles were predictable and tame.”
So there you have it…the D6 SuperBowl winners and losers. While this year’s #brandbowl was not an overwhelming great set of advertisements, one thing is clear. You should go buy a car. We can’t remember which one, but the auto industry will surely need to recoup the money they just invested.
