Hasta La Creative!

The Super Bowl is known as much for its groundbreaking ads as it is for football. The brands that choose to take the plunge and spend over $100,000 per second of advertising often push the creative limits to make those valuable marketing dollars count. While the Super Bowl ad season is dominated by consumer brands, b-to-b marketers should pay close attention to their b-to-c colleagues’ strategies and tactics and apply the following principles to their own campaigns this year.

1.Take risks. Consumer brands seem much more willing to take risks and have the courage to fail, while b-to-b marketers tend to play it safe. Be bold; while consumer brands are risking a lot with edgy commercials during something as significant as the Super Bowl, the potential rewards can be worth it. Look at the Volvo Trucks Van Damme ad from last year that attracted attention for many reasons, one of which was how unique it was, especially for a b-to-b ad. Volvo reportedly spent $3 million on the ad, and it generated $175 million in revenue.

2. Don’t blow your budget. Last year, Newcastle Brown Ale created a highly successful and clever YouTube video campaign that went viral, without spending the millions that many brands did on the Super Bowl. In fact, the lack of ad spend is what helped the campaign be so memorable. The right message targeted at the right audience can be as effective, if not more so, than a costly TV spot.

Continue reading at AdAge.com