In a record year for Super Bowl advertising revenue, with Fox already hauling in nearly $700 million from ad sales and multiple 30-second spots clocking in north of $8 million, sports marketing and media buying agency Optimum Sports sees it all from the inside.
The company handled 25% of Super Bowl LIX ad spending, marking four straight years of growth.
“This is a behemoth of an event,” said Jeremy Carey, chief investment officer at Optimum Sports. “We’re at a point now where we look at being a Super Bowl advertiser as almost being an official partner of the Super Bowl. Once you make that purchase, and you pay to play, we have to look at it in terms of how we build out a strategy.”
Super Bowl LIX airs Sunday night on Fox, and Carey sees the event as a leveraging moment in the marketplace ahead of the spring’s advertising upfronts.
“Fox is unique, too. They don’t have a lot,” said Carey. “They’re not an NBC or a Paramount or a Disney. Sports makes up a huge percentage of their offering in the marketplace. They’re using the Super Bowl to help them make their market even stronger across the entirety of the rest of their sales model.”
Optimum increasingly values social engagement around the game, witnessing a 27% YOY growth last year in engagement around Super Bowl ads.
Categories up in this year’s Super Bowl include fan-favorites like salty snacks, beverages and quick-service restaurants, as well as telco, tech, travel, financial and auto. Streaming and studios are the only categories that are noticeably down.
“We see new brands and more brands harnessing the power of the full activation plan,” said Optimum Sports Managing Director Kristen Gray. “Maybe brands that aren’t necessarily endemic to sport, which we see more of those around the Super Bowl.”
Added Gray: “We’ve seen newer brands come in and try and bring athletes into their creative, or Fox talent into their creative. That’s an interesting change, where you’re seeing a line change between bringing certain brands and bringing the sports ecosystem into their world.”
That includes brands planning to use the Super Bowl to launch a long-term marketing campaign or product.
Omnicom (Optimum’s parent company) wasn’t surprised at the record pricing going into this year’s Super Bowl.
“We do a tremendous amount of preparation work when it goes into this in terms of understanding categorically, what the movement looks like, and it’s strong,” said Carey.
NBC already calling
Broadcast rights head to NBCUniversal for next year’s Super Bowl, and Optimum says the media company is already picking up the phone to discuss strategy.
“The biggest change for me is it’s even more runway on this stuff,” said Carey. “The logistics of getting everything done? Full disclosure, we’re still working through things on this stuff. Everyone’s looking at their final cuts, social amplification, cultural moments that we might be able to capitalize on.”