EAST LANSING, Mich. — This Sunday, as people gather around the television to watch the commercials that air during the Super Bowl XLIII (there is a game too), they may be more interested in who is not represented in the ads as well as who is.
That’s something that a group of Michigan State University professors from the Department of Advertising, Public Relations and Retailing who, for the 12th year in a row will be grading the best and worst of the commercials, will be keeping an eye on.
“There is actually more news about who is not advertising, including most automakers and FedEx, which had purchased time for ads for several years,” said Robert Kolt, an instructor in the department.
He noted that General Motors spent in excess of $77 million in Super Bowl ads during the past 15 years, just behind bigger spenders Anheuser-Busch and Pepsi.
However, Kolt and his fellow ad-watchers still believe in the power of the Super Bowl commercial.
"Advertising in the Super Bowl is still the best investment in product promotion and sales most companies can make during the year, even at $3 million for 30 seconds of time,” he said. “A cost-benefit analysis will show the Super Bowl is still a good buy for advertisers that produce great ads, but the standards for ad quality are high during the big game.”
Each MSU faculty member participating in the judging will grade the ads for creativity, strategy, execution and production values. Faculty will judge each ad in real time as the spots are viewed.
"Since the MSU faculty began judging the ads based on creativity, production value, content and sales effectiveness, many other organizations have started to do it too,” Kolt said. “This is one football game during the year when the ads are usually better than most of the games."
Last year the No. 1 ad was a beer commercial featuring a Dalmatian dog that helps train a Clydesdale to lead a beer wagon.
Listen to a related podcast on the state of the advertising industry with MSU advertising professor Bruce Vanden Bergh.
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