As a huge football fan, I always look forward to that time of the year when the Super Bowl is what everyone is talking about. But this year there is a new wrinkle, with social media such as Facebook and Twitter taking center stage. These two social media powerhouses have an estimated 700 million users worldwide, and it’s no surprise that users have been tweeting and posting about the upcoming Super Bowl.
Advertisers, who have historically spent large sums of money on Super Bowl commercials, are trying to link their clever and comical Super Bowl ads with social media. Estimates predict that 50 percent of ads shown during the Super Bowl will incorporate social media compared to just 25 percent of ads last year. For example, Visa created “Go Inside the Super Bowl with Visa” (http://sbtwitter.nfl.com/) where one can gain direct access to tweets by NFL players, executives and sports journalists. Visa even has a “tweet off” between the Steelers and Packers fans. Using a graphic of a hundred-yard field colored with the two teams’ colors, Visa is measuring the number of twitter mentions of #Packers and #Steelers at http://sbtwitter.nfl.com/matchup/. As of February 3, 2011, the Packers fans lead the Steelers fans 57 percent to 43 percent.
Mercedes-Benz is also having a promotion called “Tweet Race” where four teams driving modified 2012 C-Class coupes will compete against each other in making it to the Super Bowl. However, Mercedes-Benz added a twist by basing the teams’ fuel supplies on their own tweets and tweets from people following them. Each car will have a celebrity coach who will also help them by tweeting up their followers. Mercedes-Benz is calling it “The World’s First Twitter-Fueled Race”. VW took advantage of social media last year when it launched the “Punch Dub” commercial which drew 50,000 Facebook fans and more than one million views online.
Not to be outdone, Audi will be introducing some social media firsts this Super Bowl Sunday as well. Audi will be the first brand to display a twitter hashtag in its Super Bowl ad. The #ProgressIs hashtag will be displayed prominently during its ad.
Fans and players are also using social media by sending tweets on Super Bowl parties. Dallas Cowboy Miles Austin invited over 90,000 fans to join him for pre-Super Bowl party and a chance to win Super Bowl tickets. Other players nationwide are planning similar events closer to Super Bowl kickoff. It’s a great opportunity for fans to meet their favorite football player. I’m still holding to my dream that Darrell Green will hold a Super Bowl party at the local Green Turtle.
Posts
0 comments:
Post a Comment