It's the biggest ad event of all: The Super Bowl. Already, the 2022 game on NBC is almost 85% sold out at an estimated cost of a heady $6.5 million. According to a recent poll by The Marketing Arm, almost as many people watch the Super Bowl for its commercials (43%) as for the game itself (57%).

Get the latest Ad Age Super Bowl 2022 news here.

That's a lot riding on 30 seconds of airtime. The Super Bowl is “either the biggest waste of money or the biggest bargain ever,” said BBDO Chairman and Chief Creative Officer David Lubars. The trick is to make it a bargain. So we asked grizzled Super Bowl veterans at a half-dozen ad agencies for the keys to Big Game success. Here are 12 takeaways from those experts on how to create a spot that resonates, sells and can land your ad atop the USA Today AdMeter.

Keep it simple

No doubt there is pressure to create the perfect Super Bowl ad. But the pressure can lead to overthinking and complicated ideas that water down the message the ad is trying to convey. For this reason, every executive Ad Age spoke to for this story agreed the surest route to a great Super Bowl ad is simplicity. 

“If I asked you to name three Super Bowl commercials from last year it would take you a while,” said Lubars, whose agency is behind many successful Big Game spots for clients such as Mars Wrigley's M&Ms and Snickers brands. “If it doesn't perform high and become part of the cultural zeitgeist, it wasn't a good use of money; but if it does, it's an amazing bargain because you had 120 million eyeballs looking and talking about it. All you're buying with all that money is an opportunity but you have to make good on it. That's why people feel so much pressure, but you have to put that out of your head and just do something really good like you ordinarily would.”

Lubars emphasized the importance of making the ads more visual and less reliant on audio, given that the game is typically watched at parties where people are distracted. David DeMuth, chair and CEO of Doner, whose agency had done many Super Bowl spots for clients including Stellantis, says he likes to follow a basic criteria when it comes to the Big Game commercials.

“Does it say something that people might care about or respond to? Does it reflect the voice and values of the brand? And then finally, is it going to entertain people in some way? I don't think you want to get too caught up, because that's when the work gets watered down and becomes meaningless. For the Super Bowl, most importantly, you have to ask, 'Does it say something that's going to really get an emotional response out of people?' That might be a laugh or the ad could make them think about an issue more deeply.”

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Open your own playing field

Forming the right agency team for your Super Bowl spot can be the difference between a field goal and a touchdown. 

Most of the executives interviewed for this story say they like to open the field for different teams throughout the creative department to come up with ideas, and the best ideas dictate which teams will work on the ad. Margaret Johnson, chief creative officer of Goodby Silverstein & Partners, said this internal jump ball is typically open to even the most junior staff on the creative team and the process of coming up with ideas and pitching to clients could easily take a few months. Over time she has noticed a few characteristics of creatives that tend to succeed in creating Super Bowl campaigns.

“A lot of times we've had creatives that are musicians, actors on Broadway, or comedians, people who don't get too attached to one idea and can easily pivot if something changes," said Johnson, whose agency has created many memorable Super Bowl spots for the likes of Pepsi, Doritos and more.

Johnson has also noticed that “culture vultures” typically come up with the best ideas because they are in tune with what is going on in the world. For the past few years these American culture enthusiasts have actually been coming from outside of the country for the agency.

“The Super Bowl is such an American thing and we have a lot of international talent in our creative department,“ Johnson said. “For the last few years, the teams that have really knocked it out of the park on Super Bowl have been from Australia or from Brazil and I think it's because they have grown up watching American culture unfold and they are fascinated and willing to be a part of it.”

Greg Hahn, chief creative officer and co-founder of Mischief@No Fixed Address, says that in his experience, when it comes to agency-of-record relationships, the creative teams that have worked on the account typically get the work. “It’s nice to reward the people who are doing the day-to-day work and they’re good creatives so it’s not like you’re settling for them,” Hahn said.

Don't be afraid to cut it close

Each campaign is unique, so timing from start to completion can vary. However, for Jay Russell, chief creative officer of GSD&M, which will be handling the upcoming Avocados from Mexico's Super Bowl spot, less is more. (The spot below was created by the agency for the 2017 Super Bowl.)

“It's different from client to client, but I love it if you get briefed in August and have a few months to really dig in there, turn over every stone, have enough time to look for a director, but then you have just a couple days to shoot,” Russell said. “The key is to press as much as possible so there's no overthinking. Ideas come when they come, but when it comes down to execution, I think for the most part less is more. The more you can operate on your gut with the Super Bowl, the better.”

Timeframes can also be affected by celebrity schedules and if special effects will be used in a certain spot. This could increase the time needed but ultimately it is possible to have too much time to work on a commercial, according to DeMuth. In fact, Doner’s Super Bowl commercial starring Bruce Springstein, called “The Middle,” took three weeks to make and was shot in just five days.

“The timing has been right for a lot of the best Super Bowl commercials,” DeMuth said. “The message, the celebrity, the moment all line up really well. If you start too far in advance, you might not be as zoned into the cultural zeitgeist of the moment. Obviously, if you start too late, you may not complete the work or you may compromise the work somehow. I know a lot of the bigger advertisers today do 'jump balls'  between a bunch of agencies and they might make a couple of spots and think about which one is right for the moment as the game approaches.”

But there are pitfalls with starting too late. GS&P's Johnson said the agency typically starts coming up with and testing ideas for Frito-Lay around the previous fall or summer, and starts booking talent and directors to start production around October.

Answering your most pressing Super Bowl commercial questions

“​​We start early because that gives us the best chance of locking down the best talent and the best directors,” Johnson said. “You don't want to be scrambling at the end over Thanksgiving and Christmas trying to pull it all together.”

Avoid the 'lowest common denominator'

The Super Bowl is the one time advertisers know that around 100 million-plus people will be tuned into one single program. However, trying to be too broad can be detrimental to your ad.

“We always look for what is the great relevant insight that consumers relate to,” said Mark Gross, co-founder and chief creative officer of Highdive, whose shop has done high-scoring Super Bowl spots for the likes of Rocket Mortgage, Jeep and more. “You could fall victim to trying to go so broad and so wide that you talk to no one. I don't think you're ever going to reach 100% of the people, and that's O.K. You want to reach enough people to make it worth it but you don't want to water down the work to a point that you’re just focusing on grabbing everyone because it's impossible.”

Many brands feel they have to appeal to the “lowest common denominator,” according to Hahn, who says brands should aim for singularity instead.

“The more specific you are, the more universal you can be,” Hahn said. “People are afraid of doing something that feels singular in just talking to one person. They want to be as broad as possible. And I think you lose people that way when the best kind of stuff that really resonates is the stuff that people think ‘Only I got that,’ and then you find out the world is sharing that, too.”

As an example, Hahn, a former BBDO exec, pointed out a text he received from a friend after Mountain Dew’s 2016 Super Bowl “PuppyMonkeyBaby” ad done by that agency.

“He was like, ‘What the hell was that?’ And then about an hour later, he said ‘Every kid in this Super Bowl party is saying, PuppyMonkeyBaby and they won't stop,’” Hahn said. “Which is the exact effect you want to have. It speaks to a passionate group of people that are willing to spread it. It was seen by everybody but appreciated by just the right people. There are other ways that brands like Budweiser try to go for stuff that everybody loves and they've been successful at that. I find when you try to do stuff that everybody loves, people feel ambivalent towards it.”

One way brands have been able to be more targeted in their advertising during the Super Bowl is through the use of vignettes, Chad Broude, co-founder and chief creative officer of Highdive said.

“I think we've seen the last few years spots that have more of a vignetted approach and they can get a little bit more niche and they could get a little bit more insight on some cultural things, but they kind of spread the wealth. You'll see people highlight a popular show or movie and then sometimes the brands are doing a good job of doing three or four of them, so they can hit different demos, for each scene that they're going to highlight.”

Make it interactive–to a point

As technology and the number of platforms have advanced so have consumers' involvement with ads. For example, last year Procter & Gamble unveiled a crowdsourced ad featuring multiple celebrities and brands that allowed consumers to choose the scenes for the ad in real-time. 

“If you can create interaction with the ad, that's better because you get a certain segment of people going deeper with your brand, even if that's simply directing people to a website, that allows them to experience more,” DeMuth said. “That’s good work for the brand because a key metric of a lot of Super Bowl ads—beyond where you rank in the game, the likeability, and the Super Bowl Meter—is how much website traffic did you generate? How many people got the message enough that they wanted to check you out more?”

However, if a brand is going to have interactive elements tied to its ad, it has to be in a meaningful and unique way.

“People just want to sit back and relax,” Hahn said. “I'm sure there's going to be some interactive elements this Super Bowl because there's so many new ways to interact, QR codes have become pretty ubiquitous. But you've got to keep it simple. I think if you're going to do something like that it has to work on two levels. The ad has to be great on its own and then if you go further, maybe it takes on a different meaning,  becomes something else altogether, or it's just a fuller experience, but I don't think you can rely on that to carry a Super Bowl ad. A technological play has to work on its own.”

According to The Marketing Arm’s poll, 70% of respondents said they would prefer to sit back and enjoy the ads and not interact or be called upon to take an action. For GS&P's Johnson, interactive ads, like its Cool Ranch Doritos spot which incorporated an AR app that allowed users to adopt Lil Nas X’s dance moves, are crucial for making younger people feel connected to a brand. 

“Older people are more likely to be locked in watching the whole Super Bowl,'' Johnson said. “Gen Z is going to be watching, but distracted by their phones, they're going to have their phones and are going to be multitasking. I think you want to kind of generally speak to everyone, but you have to know that not everyone is locked in. So that's why for us, we always try to have a really great mobile social interactive component to the campaign so that you're not just depending on the spot itself, but you have a little something that's more interactive for a younger audience."

This upcoming Super Bowl will be unique given the rise of metaverse-related products such as NFTs, cryptocurrency, AR and VR. Late last month, cryptocurrency exchange platform FTX confirmed it will air its first Super Bowl ad in 2022 and Crypto.com, a payment and currency platform, is expected to run multiple commercials. Executives are expecting to see NFTs make an appearance in some way during the Super Bowl.

“Every year there’s something in culture that’s so topical you know it’s going to happen,” Russell said. “I guarantee there'll be something that's like ‘Buy the rights to this commercial as an NFT.’”

Cliches can be your friend

There are certainly cliches that are synonymous with Super Bowl ads such as babies or animals. But does that make them off limits? Not necessarily.

“There’s a lot of [Super Bowl ad tropes],” DeMuth said. “There's things like dogs, babies, and dancing or dogs and babies dancing at the same time. But every once in a while somebody will take one of those things and do something brilliant and beautiful with it. I don't think you should close your mind to anything when you're working on the Super Bowl other than the obvious things that could be offensive to people.”

“As long as the idea is super original, you can play in cliche territory, just make sure you do it well,” Gross added.

On the other hand, Lubars says creatives should avoid “anything that already has been done.”

“Don't come back with what won accolades the year before, because that's been done and the Super Bowl has to be a platform of originality and effervescence," he said. Hahn says the inspiration for “PuppyMonkeyBaby” was because those were the three “most played out” themes. He pointed out ads like “The Force” which was a Volkswagen commercial featuring a young boy dressed as Darth Vader and Reddit’s five-second ad as examples of spots that went beyond traditional Super Bowl spots.

One way to get around cliches is to make something old new. “For Cheetos, nostalgia plays a big part in [their] campaigns," Johnson said, referring to its Super Bowl spots featuring MC Hammer and Shaggy. “If you think about the work we've done on Cheetos, 'Can't Touch This' and 'It Wasn't Me' are both nostalgic songs that are just fun. They have the right spirit for the brand."

"It's something that's a bit more classic, been around for a while and just lasted over the years," she said. "It’s going to play well on the day and you don't have that risk of not being culturally relevant.”

Choose your celebrities wisely

Fifty-four percent of viewers prefer Big Game commercials with celebrities, The Marketing Arm study found, and advertisers use them plenty. The 2021 Super Bowl hosted its own red carpet of stars like Tracy Morgan, Mila Kunis, Ashton Kutcher, Bruce Springsteen, Drake, Cardi B, Will Ferrell, Jason Alexander, Gwen Stefani and more.

While it's obvious celebrities help get attention for a spot, all the executives we interviewed say celebrities aren’t necessary for the spot to succeed and they should have a purpose for being a part of the ad. “We use celebrities for Snickers, but the reason wasn’t to just use celebrities,” Lubars said. “The whole idea was 'You're not you when you're hungry' and then we picked celebrities who are known for being a diva, cranky, or angry. The best use of celebrity is in service of the idea.”

Catch up on Super Bowl 2022 news here.

Think beyond the screen

Once there was once a time when a Super Bowl spot was all you needed during the Big Game, but today the increasing number of platforms and ways to advertise have heightened the importance of a broader strategy tied to the ad itself.

“Whenever we come up with a Super Bowl idea, we make it big enough to flex across platforms,” Johnson said.  “Whether it’s on Hulu or Snapchat, it must be an idea that can work across verticals. Take Cheetos 'It Wasn’t Me' for example. In addition to the 60-second ad that ran in the game, we also cut the spot down to 30-seconds, 15-seconds and 6-seconds to live on streaming websites like Hulu and Amazon Prime and social, such as Facebook, Instagram,  YouTube and Snap. To keep mobile users engaged in the ad during the game, we created a first-of-its kind partnership with Snapchat via Snap-to Steal as well as the 'It Wasn’t Me' challenge on TikTok. We even released a Super Bowl-specific version of Shaggy’s hit 'It Wasn’t Me' on Spotify.” 

Watch: How Cheetos shot its Super Bowl 2021 commercial

Broude says he and Gross like to look for memorable scenes within the ad itself that could translate into content that becomes a part of culture. 

“That’s what gives the concept of the spot life potentially years beyond its actual airing,” Broude said. “Look at the Jason Mamoa spot we did for Rocket. We still see memes of things like ‘What you thought the Chicago Bears were and what they really are.’ We go in with an attention to detail, like what are gonna be those moments that could transcend the actual 30 or 60 and become a 'Saturday Night Live' bit or online on Instagram or Tiktok, that's just a snapshot of the concept.”

“For the Tracy Morgan spot, we did a vignette spot,” Gross continued. “We set up the joke and then you have funny scene, followed by funny scene, followed by funny scene. And so the scene where Tracy got to jump off the bridge, we're like, 'Okay, that's perfect.' And that was our social spot that we put on TikTok and Instagram. They were big visual scenes that worked without sound.”

Think hard about pre-releasing your spot

According to The Marketing Arm’s poll, 89% of respondents say they would prefer to see a Super Bowl ad for the first time during the game. But given the steep cost of the spot, some advertisers try to get more for their money by previewing their ad in the media.

There were 35 pre-released commercials for the 2021 Super Bowl compared to 43 last year. But that doesn’t change the fact that there are benefits to creating a teaser or releasing the full ad entirely. Russell says as a creative he prefers to surprise viewers, but understands the business need for an early release. 

“The longer you have it out, the more early PR and return-on-investment you're going to get and you're going to be high on all the predictions, but the further you have it out, the less impact it has on the day of,” Russell said. “The other thing about showing early, which is important, is you can show a minute-and-a-half long commercial and that's what people remember. Thirty seconds goes by like that, but when it gets passed around both before and after, the long format is what people remember for the most part.”

At the end of the day anxiety is high for both brands and agencies. Russell said he’s been in situations where he had to talk nervous clients “off a ledge” the night before the Super Bowl, which is why it's crucial for agencies to remain calm, keep the work simple, and trust their ideas. In many cases releasing a spot early acts as reassurance for brands because they already know what feedback to expect.

“When you show stuff early it’s another comforting thing for brands,” Russell said.”If you show something the week before they get relaxed. They've already mitigated all the risks on their end emotionally.”

When considering withholding a spot DeMuth asks one simple question: “How surprising is your surprise factor?”

“An advertiser that has been purposefully intelligently coy before the Super Bowl has been Stellantis,” DeMuth said. “Whether it was Bruce Springsteen, Bill Murray in 'Groundhog Day,' Clint Eastwood in 'Halftime in America' or Eminem and 'Imported from Detroit,' they were tight-lipped right up until before the game. I think that was brilliant because there was a real surprise factor in those commercials and a real power in the moment of people all experiencing those commercials at the same time during this big game. There are others that are a little bit more jokey or humor-based that you can release in advance and if the joke is good, people like hearing it again and again.”

For Hahn, unveiling a commercial during the actual Super Bowl gives the work the best chance of standing out.

“Surprise is always good in any form of communication,” Hahn said. “Over the last couple of years, people have given away their Super Bowl spots, but I think there's still some value in waiting. It's usually the ones you don't see coming. I can understand marketers wanting to get the most out of showing a spot early and trying to get a leg up on it. But I think that's diminishing returns these days because it's been happening for too long. The brands that break through now are the ones that just show up, and you can do some teaser stuff, but revealing the spot loses a little bit of the magic.”

Don't come with just one idea

There are multiple schools of thought when it comes to pitching ideas to clients. Some agencies take a more is more approach to the number of the ideas they bring to the client’s table; others don't.

“I think a lot of other shops have a ‘Let's bring in one idea to the pitch’ mindset,” Highdive's Broude said. “We don't do that. We usually bring 10 or more, and it's all rooted in the fact that the people we're presenting to and working with have five, 10, 15 years of brand experience and knowledge. If you just bring in one or two ideas, you don't bring them into that creative process where they have a lot of knowledge that could help in bettering the spot and concept. I know a lot of other agencies have success doing other things, but for us, we find the more inclusive we can be towards that creative process, the more success we've had.”

On the other hand, Russell believes in pitching fewer ideas.

“I always like to do one or two ideas,” Russell said. “At most we'll bring in four and that's a lot because I think when you’ve been doing this long enough you kind of know the one that's going to be the one, but sometimes you have to show more to show why that one works.”

Johnson falls in the middle of the two ways of thinking, partly due to ideas with certain celebrities in mind.

“Usually we’ll bring five or six ideas,” she said. “You could end up with any of them because things fall away for lots of different reasons. That you build around a celebrity and that celebrity is not interested or the client for whatever reason, doesn't like a particular spot. You want to have enough in the mix that you have options, but want to make sure that they're all right and would do well during the Super Bowl."

Beware the blowout

Everyone interviewed said they would prefer to have a 60-second spot over a 30-second spot because it allows the agency more time to tell the brand’s story. Russell, in particular, said he prefers either a 60-second or even a 5-second spot, pointing out Reddit’s ad this year as an example.

"Sixty seconds is just more time you have to tell the story which is great," Russell said. "But also with less time, beyond the 30 which we’re all used to, [the ad] got to work really hard and grab a lot of attention, so you know it's going to be pretty fresh. It's got to be a pretty arresting idea.”

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All executives interviewed said brands should try to get their ads in as early as possible because later into the actual Super Bowl, the game itself could become a blowout causing people to tune out. 

"You want to be one of the first," Hahn said. “I think the first few slots are when everyone's really paying attention, unless it's a great game at the end, but that's a gamble. If you have the means to be in the Super Bowl and you're going to go for it try to get in early in the first quarter at least.”

An exception can be made if a spot is tailored around a certain moment during the game like Chrysler’s “Halftime in America,” spot featuring Clint Eastwood that aired after the first half of the game.

This year, go for laughs

Given the ongoing pandemic, all our interviewees said they expect to see an emphasis on comedy this upcoming Super Bowl. And that’s exactly what viewers want: According to The Marking Arm’s survey, 97% of viewers say they want Big Game ads to make them laugh.“Now, more than ever, people are looking to laugh and they're searching for that in their lives,'' Gross said. “We've seen enough pain going on with the pandemic. I think they want to be entertained. and I think tonally, you're going to see a lot of that this year.”

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