The Taylor Swift effect on Super Bowl advertising has been massive already, and the game is still days away.

In fact, the pop star has more mentions than all Super Bowl brands on X, formerly Twitter. Since Jan.1, there were 278,000 mentions of Swift on X and there were 164,000 mentions of all confirmed Super Bowl advertisers combined, according to Sprinklr, which tracks social media for marketers. Swift’s total mentions have reached 46.1 million, including all social media and news articles. In comparison, Rihanna tallied 7.8 million mentions through Super Bowl 57 with her highwire halftime performance last year.

As an example of Swift’s star power, last week, Sheertex noticed Swift sporting its hosiery after the Kansas City Chiefs clinched a Super Bowl berth and posted a photo of her tights to Instagram. It promptly sold out of the same style of black tights, according to a representative for Sheertex. “We can confirm the Swift effect is real,” a Sheertex spokesperson said in an email.

There’s been plenty of momentum around Swift and her relationship with Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. And heading into Super Bowl Sunday, Swift is coming off of two Grammy wins, including making history as the only person to ever win Album of the Year four times. While accepting one of her awards, Swift announced her new album, “The Tortured Poets Department,” will drop on April 19.  

As Super Bowl marketers get ready for the Big Game, they also are planning their Swift strategies. Swift has given a rating boost to NFL playoff games—last week’s Chiefs game on CBS reached 55 million viewers, up 17% from the comparable game a year ago. More young women are tuning into games to catch glimpses of the singer, offering an opening for brands to tailor some of their messages.

Also read: Taylor Swift was a top marketer in 2023

“As we get closer and closer to that day [Super Bowl], the amount of content is just going to continue to grow,” said Ariel Sims, head of paid social at agency Digitas, “and it will get to a point we haven’t seen previously from any of the other Super Bowls.”

Brands’ swift reaction

This past Sunday, Super Bowl brands had a chance to test real-time social media messages after Swift won two Grammy Awards and announced her new album. Super Bowl advertiser Drumstick posted a reference to Swift’s album “Reputation” on Instagram, the album fans had assumed she would rerecord as she did other works like “Red” and “1989.” Instead, Swift announced a “secret” new album coming in April.

Read more: Brands enter their ‘Tortured Poets Department’ era

On Monday, Reese’s featured three posts atop its Instagram page, saying: “This is your sign,” promoting its new caramel peanut butter cups, the product at the center of its Super Bowl campaign. The brand commented on its own post: “Currently, in our caramel era,” referencing Swift’s Eras Tour.

Last week, American Airlines earned attention by scheduling Flight 1989, a Swift album name, from Kansas City to Las Vegas on Super Bowl Sunday.

These are the ways most brands are tapping into Swift trends, with winks to her fandom, according to Christina Goswiller, head of social media at Digitas. “There are ways to creatively hint at Taylor,” Goswiller said, “especially because her fans are always looking for easter eggs. That’s just a huge part of her brand and even how she creates content for herself.”

Meanwhile, Hilton, which currently has not said that it will advertise in the Super Bowl, created a commercial for the Grammy Awards that depicted friends in a hotel room after attending a concert and sharing friendship bracelets, a Swiftie tradition.

Check out the latest Super Bowl ad updates here

Swift’s orbit

Swift’s popularity has rubbed off on Kelce and his family, too. Kelce is a two-time Super Bowl champ and all-time great tight end, but his Swift romance has boosted his reach, according to John Cassillo, an analyst at TVREV, a media research firm. Kelce already works with Campbell’s, DirecTV, Nike, Tide and Pfizer, among others. But his social media reach soared after appearing with Swift in September.

“A brand wanting to reach Swift’s audience and find a new audience, as well, could work with [Travis] Kelce for less than it would cost to work with Taylor,” said, “given the fact that his posts would now be delivered to at least a portion of her fan base.”

Kelce’s Instagram grew by 309% in the past year (he has 5.8 million followers as of writing), and women and girls make up more than 44% of his audience, which is “something you can attribute at least in part to his relationship with Taylor Swift,” Cassillo said, citing stats from CreatorIQ, the social analytics firm.

Kelce’s brother, Jason, his wife Kylie Kelce, and even their mother, Donna Kelce, have brands lining up. The whole family shot to fame after last year’s Super Bowl, when the brothers faced off for opposing teams, with Travis’ Chiefs defeating Jason’s Eagles.

Jason Kelce recently starred in one of Reese’s social media teaser videos for its Super Bowl commercial. On Monday, the NFL posted videos to X and a TikTok of Jason and Kylie Kelce at Disney World with their kids.

Kylie Kelce also is working with Dove, another Super Bowl brand, which has an ad encouraging body positivity among female athletes. Kelce, a field hockey coach, has made social media posts for Dove.

Donna Kelce works with Ibotta, the cash-back e-commerce app, and she recently made a TikTok while baking cookies in a promotion for the app. “She is someone who gets it and really mirrors a lot of our audience,” said Rich Donahue, chief marketing officer of Ibotta.

The timing and Super Bowl storyline are coming together perfectly, Donahue said.

“That speaks to just the cultural phenomenon and attention that Donna’s getting, that the whole Kelce family is getting,” Donahue said, “and obviously it accelerated from what’s going on with Taylor and Travis. It just speaks to the moment.”

Swift rivals

The Kelce clan is not the only game in town, though. San Francisco 49ers star Christian McCaffrey and girlfriend Olivia Culpo are social media darlings. Kristin Juszczyk, married to San Francisco 49er Kyle Juszczyk, became popular after she made a custom Chiefs puffer jacket for Swift, and she created a 49ers-inspired fit for Culpo. Now, the designer has a licensing deal with the NFL.

The fashion and beauty aspects of Super Bowl have never been more prominent, according to Goswiller of Digitas.

“It’s largely due to Taylor,” Goswiller said, “just the sheer amount of attention from different audiences and specifically younger women paying attention to the Super Bowl and NFL.”

There is a slew of beauty brands in the game. E.l.f. bought a regional ad last year, but this year it went national with a Super Bowl commercial. This year, NYX Cosmetics has a regional spot, and it is all over social media. NYX is ranked second in the top 10 ads category, measured by Sprinklr. On X, NYX is the fifth-most mentioned brand, and e.l.f is right behind it, according to Sprinklr.

NYX’s TikTok strategy shows how these beauty brands could appeal to their demographic, which likely overlaps largely with Swift fandom. One video features a makeup artist applying products while listing off the basics of football for girls. Another video shows a girlfriend trying to get a reaction from her boyfriend by calling out makeup terminology while watching a game. Earlier this season, Swifties created a similar trend by filming their boyfriends while trolling them, saying that Swift made the NFL and Travis Kelce popular, just to get a reaction.

Swift anti-fandom

Not everyone is a Swiftie. On X, 43% of Swift mentions are negative, according to Sprinklr. On Reddit, that number rises to 74%. There is one haven for Swift on Reddit, and that’s the r/taylorswift subreddit, which has a “megathread” devoted to the Chiefs every game she attends.

There has been a noticeable Swift backlash, where fans have begrudged the attention she garners from TV crews filming her in attendance, although those moments have been brief. There also have been bizarre conspiracy theories that the NFL and political forces orchestrated her involvement in football festivities.

At times even Swift has seemed annoyed with the attention. At the Chiefs-Ravens game on Jan. 27, CBS’s camera crew lingered on the singer in her skybox and flashed a Grammys promotion. Swift seemed to mouth, “Go away, please,” before the camera jutted away.

It’s no wonder networks want to capture Swift though during the games. Her fans are tuning in to watch her, and her star power moves ratings. Chiefs games were among five of the top 10 highest-rated regular season NFL games this year, according to iSpot, the TV measurement firm. The Chiefs-Ravens game earned a record as the most-watched AFC Championship game with 55 million viewers.

“It’s hard for the Super Bowl to net ‘new’ viewers year-over-year at this point, yet the Taylor Swift-Travis Kelce relationship could help fuel just that as the game draws in previously passive or completely uninterested viewers,” REVTV’s Cassillo said.

The NFL also has good reason to focus on Swift on social media. Last week, one video of Swift embracing Travis Kelce after he advanced to the Super Bowl generated 7.5 million views and almost a million likes.

NFL’s average TikTok views are 1.5 million over the past 90 days, and Swift is partly responsible, Cassillo said. The post of Swift kissing Travis Kelce garnered 333% higher “earned media” value than the average NFL post, Cassillo said. Earned media is the amount a brand would have to spend to get the equivalent marketing boost.

Posts of McCaffrey and Culpo also drive significantly higher earned media, 150%-plus, Cassillo said. NFL has clearly embraced Swift, especially on TikTok, where it has a section dedicated to videos for “Swifties.” 

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell publicly addressed the Taylor-Travis buzz on Monday, saying, “having the Taylor Swift effect is also a positive.”

“It creates another group of young fans, particularly young women, that are interested in seeing, why is she going to this game, why is she interested in this game, besides Travis, she is a football fan,” Goodell said, “and I think that’s great for us.”

The only uncertainty around Swift’s appearance at the game is that she is set to perform in Tokyo the night before the Super Bowl. Some Swifties were concerned that she could miss the game, and there have been videos analyzing flight path data and airport parking availabilities. Swift’s flight plan spawned a new genre of fan analysis videos on TikTok, Digitas’s Goswiller said. Last week, the Japanese Embassy in the U.S. even issued a statement alerting fans to the fact that a flight could make it to Las Vegas in time.

“Right now TikTok is filled with conspiracy theories,” Goswiller said, adding that is how brands can communicate with Swift fans, through references to the intrigue. “Not just with real Swifties, the big fans, but with anybody interested in the cultural zeitgeist.”