January 26, 2003
For Information Contact: Kathy DeBoer
(602) 707-0050
Super Bowl Ad Hits & Misses
Real-time Reactions To Super Bowl Ads
Show Budweiser, Sierra Mist Big Winners
PHOENIX -- The Buccaneers may have soundly beaten the Raiders, but the
real winners of Super Bowl XXXVII were Budweiser and Sierra Mist.
WestGroup Research of Phoenix crashed the Super Bowl party of Cliff and
Margo Hanks in Scottsdale to uncover this year's "hits" and
"misses."
The panel of experts were residents from Scottsdale, Phoenix, Chandler,
Tempe and Cave Creek who gathered at the Hanks' home to enjoy good food,
football and, of course, the commercials.
WestGroup Vice President Kathy DeBoer
equipped each guest with a Perception Analyzer
(PA) dial to record viewer reactions. A PA consists of a hand-held dial,
which allowed WestGroup to record guests' reactions to the most expensive
advertising of the year. While a commercial was on, guests turned the
knobs of dials, indicating their reactions throughout the airing. With
the help of a wireless connection to a PC, information was translated
into data and graphic output. Think of the PA as today's version of the
"Applause-O-Meter."
The information garnered was anecdotal, not statistically valid, research.
"Commercials with an element of the unexpected were most often rated
highly. The movie trailers and TV previews, on the other hand, consistently
received low ratings" according to DeBoer. There were lots of laughs
for clever twists to the plots - the zebra referee, the fire hydrant exploding,
the castaway discovering he had what he needed all along, or the football
player turned internal motivator at a business. The group also liked the
more sentimental or emotional approach of the commercials such as the
anti-smoking appeal, anti-drug "youngest parent" commercial,
and the Sony, "Show them the tape" ad.
The movie trailers were consistently rated low, primarily due to the subject
matter of the movies shown. This audience said they were not at all interested
in the movies shown, nor with most of the previews for the ABC shows -
Miracles, Dragnet, Alias, and the Bachelorette.
As expected, males were more likely to rate the commercials with sex appeal
higher than the women and were more interested in the previews for upcoming
sporting events or shows.
A videotape of excerpts from the highlights and low lights with overlays
of the group ratings is available from WestGroup Research upon request.
