• by Paul Gough , January 29, 2003

Take a celebrity or two, add some humor, and you’ve got the makings of a commercial that will score high in Intermedia Advertising Group’s brand-recall ratings. This year’s Super Bowl commercials were no different, with a spot featuring the Osbourne family and a Tom Hanks look-alike/Castaway scored the highest in IAG’s survey of Super Bowl commercials.

IAG said Pepsi Twist’s spot with Ozzy Osbourne stuck in a Donny and Marie world had the highest brand-recall of any of the Super Bowl spots. IAG’s Website surveys test TV ads’ effectiveness. Second on the list as FedEx’s “Castaway” spoof, followed by Visa Check Card’s spot with Tiki Barber and Hanes’ spot with Jackie Chan and Michael Jordan. Fifth in brand recall was Pepsi’s Sierra Mist spot with zoo baboons.

“Data confirms that when celebrity spokespersons like the Osbournes are combined with timely humor, it can produce an outstanding result. In addition, we’re reminded that creative humor can also work well – a concept that paid off for Fed Ex this year,” said IAG co-CEO Kenneth Orkin.

But Orkin said another spot, featuring Reebok’s Terry Tate, didn’t score as well in recall.

“This ad would have been a top 5 performer if people had known it was a Reebok ad,” Orkin said. Top 10 performers included in product categories beer, soft drinks, financial services, automotive and apparel.

IAG also measures likeability. Many of the top 10 ads were Budweiser. The top five ads were Budweiser’s Clydesdales replay, the Fed Ex and Pepsi Twist spots, Reebok’s Terry Tate spot and a reggae-themed spot for Bud Light.

Also this week, IAG announced its top 10 new commercials for the weeks of Jan. 6-19. In terms of brand recall, Burlington Coat Factory’s ad featuring a bathrobed man who is locked out of his house was first and Sierra Mist and Breathe Right ads were second and third. In commercial likeability, Hershey’s spot about women favoring chocolate over men came in first place.

The top 10 spots for brand recall were:

1. Burlington Coat Factory, nature provides animals with winter coats, man locked out of house.
2. Sierra Mist, free sample of Sierra Mist at KFC, man in disguise.
3. Breathe Right Nasal Strips, boy on bed, head flattens (:15).
4. 10-10-220, Hulk Hogan and Terry Bradshaw try ballet.
5. Saturn Ion, drives past swings, “now leaving childhood”/”old age ahead”
6. Radio Shack, Accessories vs. Shaq-cessories, Shaq compares stores to Radio Shack.
7. Hallmark From My Heart Bear, white teddy bear on orange soda conveyor belt.
8. MSN 8, butterfly at front door pulls level to get rid of unwanted solicitors.
9. Excedrin, QuickTabs – man, “fit in pocket better than glass of water.”
10. Burger King Whopper, Steve Harvey announces that the Whopper is 99 cents (:15).

IAG’s top 10 in terms of likeability:

1. Hershey’s Milk Chocolate, women love chocolate more than men.
2. Snickers, quarterback makes fun of New York Jets in wrong huddle.
3. Chips Ahoy! Warm ‘n Chewy, singing cookies in microwave (:15).
4. Coca-Cola Courtney Cox and David Arquette pinball.
5. Diet Dr. Pepper, Medieval Kneival launched from catapult at fair.
6. 7 Up balloon deflates at parade.
7. Diet Dr. Pepper, “The Retirement Village People.”
8. Ford Explorer, car wash employees admire SUV.
9. Coca-Cola, Penolope Cruz guzzles entire bottle.
10. Quaker Life, curlytop boy steals cereal from other cart, eats at checkout counter.

The brand recall is based on the percentage of TV viewers who can recall within 24 hours the brand of ad they were exposed to during the normal course of TV viewing. The likeability scale measures how popular the ads are by monitoring which ads most frequently scored the highest among IAG panelists. These scores are then indexed against the mean score for all ads during the time period.