• by David Goetzl  @dgoetzl, October 23, 2012

As marketers plan their strategies around their Super Bowl ads, research from Visible Measures suggests distributing clips or some other teaser videos online before the game can build engagement significantly.

That finding dovetails with marketers’ efforts to increasingly discover ways to use social media to give their ads life before and after the 30 seconds in the game.
 
Last year, Visible Measures says 34 campaigns debuted online before kickoff, on venues such as YouTube, and 20 after the final whistle. It remains a balancing act for marketers, since a pre-release can chip away at the surprise factor, which Chrysler has benefited from over the past two games with Eminem and Clint Eastwood starring in epic spots. On the flip side, an early tipoff can build anticipation.
 
The Cross Media Impact Research looked at the more than 50 campaigns in the 2012 game, which generated 3,800 clips and 340 million online views as of one month after the game. The research tracked not just the performance of the ads distributed by marketers, but mashups, spoofs and other consumer-generated versions.
 
On average, campaigns that uploaded video before the game generated 9.1 million-plus views. Of those, about 2.1 million were “social views,” coming from “copies or derivative clips.” (Figures are the total for before and after the Super Bowl.)
 
For videos uploaded only after the game, the average was about 1.3 million total views, where some 240,000 were social views. Pre-game campaigns on average generated 2.1 million social views, twice the average of total views for post-game releases.
 
Seraj Bharwani, Chief Analytics Officer at Visible Meaures, said for marketers looking to seed interest in their ads before the game, a mere release likely won’t be enough to generate mixes and mashups.
 
“Just taking a 30-second spot isn’t necessarily going to do the job,” he said. A strategic teaser or some sort of creative inspiration is needed.
 
Visible Measures’ Cross Media Impact research tracks the impact of online video efforts that run in concert with TV and other campaigns.
 
Visible Measures, whose metrics that have been accredited by the Media Rating Council, helped Volkswagen analyze its strategy for the 2012 Super Bowl, where it released online content before the game.
 
The company also worked with Procter & Gamble with its “Proud Sponsor of Moms” Olympic effort. 

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