Media Buying Briefing: Is Super Bowl LV on third and long, trailing in the game?

By jim cooper

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It’s Super Bowl season, time for America’s annual paean to excess

This year’s Big Game, Super Bowl LV, is set to be played at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa and carried on CBS Sunday Feb. 7. Usually, the buzz around who’s in and who’s out among advertisers would be in high gear, with leaks of new spots, which are going for about $5.5 million per :30, out in the market.

But as it has with almost everything in our lives, the coronavirus pandemic has affected this national — actually international — media event. For one, CBS still has inventory to sell — last year’s Super Bowl on Fox sold out by about Thanksgiving. Many longtime advertisers have decided to sit out, including Hyundai, Avocados from Mexico and Little Caesars. And though a few spots have debuted, it’s not the torrent we usually see. Cheetos just put out a suspenseful teaser starring Ashton Kutcher, but not much more is happening.

There are some first-time advertisers in this year’s game, including Fiverr, Vroom and Scott’s Miracle Gro at the time of this writing, alongside returning stalwarts like Anheuser Busch and Toyota. And though Pepsi will not advertise in game, it continues its tradition of hosting the halftime show, which this year features The Weeknd.

Outside of the broadcast of the game, brand activators around the Super Bowl ordinarily would be plotting their trick plays to gain attention and clicks, but given there’s going to be limited in-stadium attendance, even that’s muted at this point. Who does this affect the most? Tampa itself.

“Nobody’s getting hurt more by this scenario than Tampa, its businesses, and the activation opportunities that normally take place all around the Super Bowl,” said Jeff Gagne, svp of strategic investment at Havas Media. “Locally in Tampa, it’s not going to be anything like that we expected.”

It will be interesting to see how ratings pan out for Super Bowl LV. Since there will likely be fewer Super Bowl viewing parties across the country as a pandemic precaution, more viewers watching from their homes could goose ratings. Indeed, one buyer noted that HUT levels were up over the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays.

However, a small-market matchup (Buffalo/Cleveland, for example) could result in diminished viewership. Another bad harbinger: Last week’s college football championship matchup that saw Alabama crush Ohio State experienced a 7 million viewer drop-off from the equivalent game …read more

Source:: Digiday