These Super Bowl strategies had people talking long before kickoff
Doritos and Coors Light use a combination of social and earned media to prolong the conversation.
Pricy Super Bowl ads are just one part of a months-long campaign designed to engage fans before and after the game.
Dan Cohen, senior director of brand communications at PepsiCo Foods US, which owns Doritos, noted that while the Super Bowl is the biggest stage for advertising, the lead-up to the game is the most critical sales period.
This year, Coors Light and Doritos leaned into early Super Bowl strategies.
Coors Light’s stunt-driven “Case of the Mondays” campaign aimed to generate an uproar on social media, while Doritos revived its “Crash the Super Bowl” video contest after eight years, inviting fans to create their own commercial for a chance to win $1 million and have it air during the game.
Sprout Social reported Doritos had the most talked-about campaign on social media in early January.
Doritos gets competitive juices flowing
Doritos launched in September to align with the start of the NFL season. Launching that early allowed the brand to encourage extended engagement and to keep people talking through the 18-week regular season, Cohen said.
The brand’s fan-centric approach used a mix of earned media, influencer collaborations and digital activations to get people talking. Cohen said a major part of that early campaign was nostalgia. Doritos brought back two of its classic fan-made ads, “Goat 4 Sale” and “Slap.”
Those clips served as inspiration but also leaned into the “Think you can do better? mantra the brand used to fire people up.
Doritos’ approach didn’t shy away from a little trash-talking either. Using what Cohen described as self-aware marketing, the team highlighted past social media criticisms of its ads on billboards and digital platforms. This “playful challenge,” as Cohen called it, encouraged fans to make their own commercial.
“Our goal was to build excitement among fans and generate mass awareness for the creators behind this contest,” Cohen said.
January marked a pivotal phase as Doritos unveiled its semifinalists. The brand shifted from an all-out national focus to placing more an emphasis on the home markets of each of the 25 semifinalists.
Doritos reached out to local TV stations, newspaper and even nontraditional media outlets to set up interviews with semifinalists in their hometowns to feed off the homegrown energy of the event. It also spotlit each of the semifinalist ads on Doritos’ owned social channels, primarily Instagram, where the brand has more than 1 million followers.
Each earned placement and social spot incorporated a call-to-action that invited fans to visit DoritosCrash.com to watch and share their favorite submissions.
To reveal the three finalists, Doritos enlisted Kansas City Chiefs players Patrick Mahomes, Chris Jones, Xavier Worthy and Creed Humphrey. The “Focus Group” spot, featuring the athletes reacting to the ads, aired across digital platforms, online video and social media during the NFL playoffs.
From Jan. 1 to Jan. 21, “Crash the Super Bowl” generated 1,709 mentions and 23,189 engagements in the lead-up to announcing its winners, Dylan Bradshaw and Nate Norell, earlier this week on Today.
Coors Light focuses on ‘creating cultural moment’
Coors Light’s “Case of the Mondays” campaign aimed to tap into the “post-Super Bowl slump” people experience the day after big game.
The campaign includes a 60-second commercial with lazy sloths struggling through a Monday that will air during the Super Bowl. The overarching goal was to reinforce Coors Light’s image as fun, chill and “always in tune with how people are feeling,” said Marcelo Pascoa, vice president of marketing.
But that commercial is just one part of a much more involved effort.
Alongside PR agency Alison Brod Marketing + Communications, Coors Light launched a stunt on Monday, Jan. 13, deliberately misspelling “refreshment” as “refreshment” on ads in newspapers, above Times Square and elsewhere. Social media commenters quickly noticed and let the beer brand have it.
Pascoa called the stunt a playful way to generate social conversation and media curiosity around whether it was real.
“It gave us a unique way to enter the conversation that felt organic and ownable,” he said.
The brand quickly owned the “mistake” via a press release, citing a survey it conducted with Talker Research, which found that 60% of Americans and Canadians say they experience a “Case of the Mondays” after the Super Bowl.
Media from around the world picked-up the statement and as conversation gained traction, Coors Light rolled out the next phases, beginning with a limited-edition “Mondays Light” beer packaging.
The Coors Light team is tracking engagement, cultural relevance and conversation, Pascoa said. Metrics such as social sentiment, share of voice and earned media value will be key indicators of success.
“Impressions matter, but real engagement — people talking, sharing and interacting with the brand — is what we care about,” Pascoa said. He added that success won’t be measured by product sales alone.
“If we can make people laugh, spark conversation and create a moment they’ll remember, we’ve done our job,” Pascoa said.
Casey Weldon is a reporter for PR Daily. Follow him on LinkedIn.
This article was extremely insightful in to how brands are thinking months in advance on ads by creating engagement throughout the ad design process rather than just the on game day during their commercial spot. I love how Doritos engaged through fan participation to create buzz months in advance, and Coors Light’s “Case of the Mondays” campaign and misspelling “refreshment” was a clever way to be even more relatable to its consumers. It’s a great reminder that real success in marketing isn’t just about day-of impressions, but about creating conversations and building lasting connections with the audience. -Abby Cope, Platform Magazine Contributing Writer/ Editor