Pepsi’s decision to skip the Super Bowl was probably a good idea. Advertising Age, which tracks ad campaign popularity from week to week, reports that viral campaigns from before the Super Bowl are already regaining traction.
Pepsi’s money is probably better spent building a dedicated user base with their Refresh Everything social campaign. And opting out of the $12m Super Bowl buy fits nicely with their “do good on a small scale” message.
From AdAge’s “Most Super Bowl Ads Don’t Go Viral”:
NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — This week’s chart is a testament to the power of TV. Now that the Super Bowl is a fading memory, so are many of the Super Bowl ads, meaning TV was the key driver of their popularity, rather than a groundswell of demand on the web.
This week, only four ads from last week’s Bowl-dominated chart remain: Doritos, Snickers, E-Trade and Google, while a fifth Super Bowl ad, from Bud Light, joins the list for the first time. Doritos came in at No. 1 with an impressive 5 million views, even though that’s a 73% drop from last week. Gone are many of the ads that generated heat around the game, such as Audi’s “Green Police,” Tim Tebow’s Focus on the Family ad and Motorola’s Megan Fox ad.
But while ads from the big game fade, some of the more durable viral campaigns are returning to the list, a testament to their lasting power. It’s the difference between a surge in audience powered by marketing and exposure from a big event, and a sustained viral campaign, powered by social media and marketing.
