How Super Bowl ads can generate conversations with brands... not just about them

The Super Bowl is over! And so are the hilarious TV Super Bowl ads around it. As every year, they were super creative, super expensive, and reached millions of viewers. But reaching an audience is only half of the trick. Engaging them in conversations with your brand is the other. In this quick read, you'll get some inspiration on how Super Bowl ads can potentially do both.

Super Bowl LVI is officially over. Past Sunday, up to 100 million Americans and over 800 million people worldwide witnessed maybe the biggest sports and TV event of the year.

As the Cincinnati Bengals and Los Angeles Rams battled it out on the field, the fans watching at home were in for a treat. Again, besides world class football, super creative TV commercials are what a lot of them had an eye on. 

Super Bowl ads: More than just building your reach

The amount of money paid for TV commercials during the Super Bowl broadcast are famously known to be mind boggling. With 6.5 million dollars for a 30-second ad, this years prices top those of last year by 1 million dollars.

Whether these spendings materialize for brands in more than just ad recognition is hard to know. Social Listing Tools can measure conversations about brands in the digital realm.

But aren't we already a step further than that? Why not use the immense reach as a possibility to start conversations with your customers, inspire and bond with them? So they are not only viewing your ad but engaging with it. You can get the best of both worlds, directly communicating with them while building reach.

It doesn't always have to be QR codes. But sometimes it can be!

If your first thought was QR codes, be cautious. They may simplify the engagement process for the viewer, but can lead to them not paying attention to the ad. They may be fumbling for their phones, looking for them in panic and not manage to get the shot in time. That's not what you want. Or they manage it, but have no clue what the ad was all about. That's absolutely not what you want.

Instead, you can use your phone number and a keyword to engage them. By displaying it throughout the ad, you will make them aware of the possibility to text your brand, traditionally by using SMS, or (even more interactive and engaging!) by using an instant messaging app like WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger. They can do so conveniently after the clip is over. A win-win situation for brand and customer.

To give credit where credit is deserved, though, Coinbase DID come up with a brilliant idea. They used a QR code, and nothing but a QR code. For 60 seconds straight, that's all people saw on their screen. This risky campaign cost them around 14 million dollars. The bouncing code reminiscent of the famous DVD screen savers was accompanied by 80s video game music. That left viewers with only on task: take out the phones and start scanning.

Scanning the QR code took you to the landing page you see below. Here, Coinbase was offering 15 US dollars in Bitcoin for every new member of the platform and gave existing ones the option to take part in a lottery over three million dollars.

The ad also performed pretty darn well. Here are some numbers:

• 20 million visits of the landing page in the first minute of the ad
• Coinbase went from 186th in the App Store to 2nd
• The servers crashed, as Coinbase saw more traffic with one ad than ever before

Make your ads interactive

Interactivity is key. Try creating interactive ads that involve group participation! More often than not, your customers are watching the Super Bowl with their friends. Typically, you’re asked to interact with an ad individually. But the Super Bowl is the perfect opportunity for you to address the whole group. People are generally more willing to do something, when they do it together with others, right?

Adding a social component to interactive ads can dramatically increase your reach and engagement. This may also lead to a conversational, shared brand experience that is a force multiplier.

Inspire brand engagement with Conversational Marketing

Conversational Marketing creates a powerful bond and leaves a lasting impact.

Marketers can now spark two-way conversations with consumers at scale through integrated messaging experiences in conversational ads. Whether it’s via WhatsApp, SMS/MMS or RCS, Facebook Messenger, Instagram DM, or any other messaging channel, you can take advantage of traditional advertising mediums, like Super Bowl commercials, to start one-to-one dialogues with individual consumers. In turn, they get rewarding relationships with your brand.

Think about continuously displaying your contact number in the spot and including a clear call to action, such as "Text us!" or "Send us a WhatsApp!". If you combine that with a keyword, a chatbot can also continue the story as soon as a user follows your invitation and starts the conversation.

A chatbot could then, for example, guide a user through a quiz or some questions, and gather some data to then offer personalized discounts or promotions. The chatbot can automatically process them in the chat, saving the customer some money while making the results of the ad campaign measurable for you.

Businesses already see the value of mobile messaging, but innovations that create personalized, contextual customer experiences across multiple channels are still ongoing.

A recent Sinch-sponsored research published in a new IDC White Paper shows 62% of enterprises are using at least two messaging channels for conversational customer engagement, while only 22% use more than three. Just like we reach for the remote to control the television, we rely on our mobile phones to manage and conduct our everyday lives.

Given the data, it’s clear that opportunity awaits the visionary marketers who extend brand experiences beyond a prime time 30-second Super Bowl ad and build deeper customer relationships using a broader mix of mobile-optimized channels.

Rethinking brand experiences

The Super Bowl is just one example showing how you can revisit your brand's mass marketing strategies. An authentic and engaging brand experience just contains more than TV ads. Your audience and you want to profit from meaningful conversations and a personal relationship.

Anytime Brands have the attention of a large audience, seize the opportunity to inspire action and be sure to invite consumers to participate in a brand experience that’s uniquely theirs. Messaging apps are ideal for this - simply because they are an integral part of everyday communication.

Combine messaging with AI chatbots for successful conversational messaging!

The next step is to engage customers in meaningful and engaging conversations by using Conversational AI. If the popularity of ChatGPT is any indicator, that's something that'll supercharge your exchange with customers. 

Brands that combine messaging with chatbots can not only save a lot of resources, but also make the exchange with their customers smoother. 

That might sound fancy, but with the right tools, getting started with conversational messaging doesn't have to be neither complicated nor costly. With ready-to-go solutions such as Sinch Engage, you get an out-of-the box messaging platform that allows you to connect with your customers on the most relevant messaging apps. In addition, you can also easily integrate AI into your conversations, either with a GPT integration or an upgraded chatbot experience.  

Putting the aspect of conversational first in your campaigns will deliver better results for your ads, even beyond the Super Bowl hype. 

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