Marketing companies bring their A-game to the Super Bowl, sparing no expense and creating their best ads to go up against and hopefully dominate the competition. The Super Bowl is a big deal for ad agencies, and they invest so much in those renowned commercials that some people watch the game for the advertisements alone. Just how many people prefer the ads to the Super Bowl?
According to a survey done by USA Today in 2014, 78 percent of the people who participated looked forward to the ads more than the big game. Given those stats, it’s no surprise that ad companies are so concerned with putting their best foot forward. It’s the one time during the year that people watch ads because they actually want to. Ad agencies need to produce pieces that appeal to as many people as possible using a blend of humor, weirdness and fictional or real characters. This year’s Super Bowl ads relied heavily on the first item in that list with some especially clever ads, like the ad for Independence Day Resurgence, referencing the Super Bowl itself. The ads also featured many well-known fictional or real characters, such as Ant-Man (played by Paul Rudd). This year a couple of new faces or, more precisely, animated faces, showed up that had not been featured in past years.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlZqBR3yTiw
The ad that I am referring to is the Coca-Cola commercial which featured Ant-Man and Bruce Banner, aka The Hulk, battling for ownership of The Hulk’s last can of Coca-Cola. In addition to the hilarious contrast between the character’s size and fighting styles, the ad reaffirmed the herculean popularity of Marvel characters in pop culture today. These are characters many people know and love, who major companies trust enough to sell their products. The company isn’t just employing these characters in TV spots. Coca-Cola is also incorporating Marvel superheroes into a can design campaign they are calling Mini Marvel Coke Cans. Coca-Cola is clearly banking on an association with these popular characters to increase their sales. Coca-Cola’s choice is a testament to the popularity and recognition power that these characters wield in today’s popular culture.