Planners guess how their favorite Super Bowl ads tested (it's hilarious)

Summary

On Strategy Showcase: Episode Summary

Title: Planners Guess How Their Favorite Super Bowl Ads Tested (It's Hilarious)
Host: Fergus O’Carroll
Release Date: February 11, 2025

Introduction

In this engaging episode of On Strategy Showcase, host Fergus O’Carroll invites marketing strategists Andrew Tindall from System One, Jamie McGill, Head of Strategy at DDB Chicago, and Stephanie A Wee, Head of Connections Planning at TBWA Chiat Day in Los Angeles, to analyze and predict how their favorite Super Bowl 2025 advertisements performed according to actual consumer testing data. Recorded on February 10th, the episode delves into the strategists' perspectives on the ads, their predictive scoring, and the subsequent revelations when compared to System One's ratings.

Guests Introduction

• Andrew Tindall (00:00): Senior Vice President at System One, responsible for consumer research and ad testing.
• Jamie McGill (02:32): Head of Strategy at DDB Chicago, experienced in overseeing impactful advertising campaigns.
• Stephanie A Wee (03:00): Head of Connections Planning at TBWA Chiat Day in Los Angeles, with a background in strategic ad planning.

Methodology of Scoring

Fergus outlines the episode's structure: each guest selects their top three favorite Super Bowl ads, predicts their System One consumer ratings on a scale of 1 to 5.9, and compares these predictions with actual scores provided by Andrew Tindall. System One evaluates ads based on brand recall, emotional engagement, and overall emotional response, with a special focus on how effectively the ad resonates with consumers.

Discussion of Favorite Ads

Number Three Picks

1. Stephanie A Wee: Coors Light - "Case of the Mondays" (10:28)

   • Stephanie's Take (10:28): Stephanie praises the ad for its clever portrayal of overcoming Monday sluggishness with humor and creativity, highlighting the cycling scene and work environment.
   • Notable Quote: “I just thought it was so fun and clever... a clever take on the case of the Mondays being their case.” (10:28)
   • Predicted Score: 4.0
   • Actual Score (Andrew): 3.0 (14:27)
   • Discussion: Stephanie expressed surprise at the mid-tier score, considering the ad's creative approach. Andrew noted that while the ad was strong, brand attribution was slightly diluted as 20% of consumers couldn’t recall the brand immediately.

2. Jamie McGill: Mountain Dew - "Kiss from a Lime" (15:39)

   • Jamie's Take (15:39): Jamie enjoyed the ad's humor and self-awareness, particularly the inclusion of Seal, which added a layer of absurdity and entertainment.
   • Notable Quote: “I thought the craft of it and the timing and everything and the extended version, I love the self-awareness.” (15:39)
   • Predicted Score: 2.6
   • Actual Score (Andrew): 1.9 (52:34)
   • Discussion: Jamie appreciated the ad's entertainment value but foresaw its polarizing effect. Andrew explained that while the longer version scored higher, the shorter 32-second spot polarized viewers, reflecting a strong spike in emotional engagement but a lower overall impression.

3. Fergus O’Carroll: Liquid Death - "Drinking on the Job" (22:05)

   • Fergus's Take (22:05): Fergus admired the ad for its strategic alignment with Liquid Death's brand identity, portraying relatable professionals humorously.
   • Notable Quote: “I like the purity of coming back to that idea... So, that would be my number three.” (22:05)
   • Predicted Score: 2.2
   • Actual Score (Andrew): 1.6 (24:27)
   • Discussion: Fergus emphasized the importance of knowing the target audience. Despite its strong alignment with the brand, the ad received a low score due to its niche appeal and polarizing content.

Number Two Picks

1. Jamie McGill: Google - "Dream Job" (27:20)

   • Jamie's Take (27:20): Jamie highlighted the emotional depth of the ad, focusing on a father's journey back into the workforce with the help of Google's AI, portraying a heartfelt and relatable story.
   • Notable Quote: “I love the way they did it and I think it was like really distinctively Google for me.” (28:10)
   • Predicted Score: 5.1
   • Actual Score (Andrew): 3.1 (30:35)
   • Discussion: Despite Jamie's high expectations, the ad scored moderately. Andrew attributed this to the challenging nature of selling AI concepts and the need for greater consumer familiarity with the technology. The emotional storytelling was effective but hindered by the abstract nature of AI.

2. Stephanie A Wee: Ram - "Goldilocks" (32:05)

   • Stephanie's Take (32:05): Stephanie appreciated the humor and high-energy storytelling, particularly Glenn Powell's performance, which effectively balanced performance and humor.
   • Notable Quote: “Lots of peaks throughout that story that got me to giggle or laugh.” (32:05)
   • Predicted Score: 3.3
   • Actual Score (Andrew): 3.7 (36:35)
   • Discussion: The Ram ad surpassed Stephanie's prediction, scoring within the top 5% globally for car ads. Andrew praised its clever use of the Goldilocks reference and broad cultural appeal.

3. Fergus O’Carroll: Uber Eats - "Celebrity Campaign" (40:30)

   • Fergus's Take (40:30): Fergus commended the ad for its seamless integration of celebrity without overshadowing the brand, ensuring strong brand recall and strategic alignment.
   • Notable Quote: “I thought it was incredibly well branded. It is very memorably Uber Eats.” (40:30)
   • Predicted Score: 4.6
   • Actual Score (Andrew): 4.1 (43:52)
   • Discussion: The Uber Eats campaign achieved high brand recall and effectively utilized celebrity presence to enhance brand messaging without deterring from the core concept.

Number One Picks

1. Stephanie A Wee: ChatGPT - "Splitting the Cells" (48:23)

   • Stephanie's Take (48:23): Stephanie lauded the ad for breaking conventional Super Bowl norms with its minimalist black-and-white storytelling, captivating the audience's attention through curiosity and innovation.
   • Notable Quote: “An ad that just broke through and got the room's attention.” (48:23)
   • Predicted Score: 1.1
   • Actual Score (Andrew): 1.2 (53:07)
   • Discussion: Stephanie accurately predicted the low score, emphasizing that while the ad successfully grabbed attention, it struggled with brand attribution and emotional connection, resulting in a minimal score.

2. Jamie McGill: Nike - "Women in Sports" (54:22)

   • Jamie's Take (54:22): Jamie appreciated Nike's moving portrayal of female athletes and the emotional resonance it created, particularly with personal connections like her 8-year-old daughter.
   • Notable Quote: “It felt very Nike Classic Nike.” (54:22)
   • Predicted Score: 2.0
   • Actual Score (Andrew): 3.2 (57:43)
   • Discussion: While Jamie anticipated a lower score due to potential polarization, the Nike ad performed robustly within its category, effectively conveying its message and resonating with a significant portion of the audience.

3. Fergus O’Carroll: Google Gemini (47:00)

   • Fergus's Take (53:42): Fergus expressed enthusiasm for the ad's strategic depth, focusing on innovation and human stories, though initially struggling to grasp its full narrative.
   • Notable Quote: “It's about innovation throughout history.” (51:06)
   • Predicted Score: 1.9
   • Actual Score (Andrew): 1.1 (52:48)
   • Discussion: Fergus predicted an exceptionally low score, highlighting the ad's complexity and the challenges consumers faced in brand attribution, aligning closely with the actual score.

Final Results and Winner

After tallying the predicted and actual scores across all top three picks, Jamie McGill emerged as the winner with a consistent alignment between her predictions and the consumer data, showcasing a deep understanding of consumer perceptions. Her selection of the Nike ad, despite its moderate score, underscored the importance of emotional storytelling and brand consistency.

Concluding Insights

The episode highlighted the discrepancy between marketing strategists' expectations and actual consumer responses. Key takeaways include:

• Brand Attribution: Effective brand recall remains a critical challenge, especially in highly creative or abstract ads.
• Emotional Engagement vs. Product Clarity: Striking the right balance between emotional storytelling and clear product messaging is essential for higher consumer ratings.
• Audience Alignment: Understanding and aligning with the target audience's preferences and perceptions can significantly impact an ad's success.
• Category Benchmarking: Evaluating ads within their specific category context provides more meaningful insights into performance and effectiveness.

Notable Quotes

• Fergus O’Carroll (04:51): “I tell you, my thought, guys, when I saw the Super Bowl yesterday was I didn't think there was a great wow spot.”
• Andrew Tindall (07:10): “My team stayed up all night testing all the spots of 10,000 Americans and it's the strongest Super Bowl yet in six years.”
• Jamie McGill (16:22): “I thought the craft of it and the timing and everything and the extended version, I love the self-awareness.”
• Stephanie A Wee (48:49): “I’m gonna say it’s like a 1.1. I think people watched him, were intrigued.”

Conclusion

This episode of On Strategy Showcase provided a fascinating glimpse into the world of Super Bowl advertising through the lens of seasoned strategists. By comparing their predictions with actual consumer data, listeners gained valuable insights into the complexities of creating impactful and memorable advertisements in one of the most competitive advertising arenas.

Transcript

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Welcome to OnStrategy Showcase. I'm Fergus O'Carroll in Chicago. We are going to be live from Toronto next Thursday night, that's February 20th at Rethink's offices from 6 to 8pm we have just a few tickets left, so if you're interested, come on to the website onstrategyshowcase.com and you can get your tickets under the live tour tab. Our theme is the rise of the independents and we are thrilled to have our live tour sponsored by amazingly supportive brands in the Effies, in wark and in tracksuit. They do an awful lot for the show and making it all possible. So I hope that you will support them in what they do. Terrific brands. So thank you to them. What we did for this episode today, we actually recorded this show about an hour ago. We recorded it on Monday night, the 10th of February. It's gonna go live tomorrow morning. And I wanted to thank our team for making this happen, not only for our guests who came in to be a part of this, but also for our editing team and others who are sort of hustling to make this happen overnight. Tonight, this episode drops. Tomorrow. We actually are gonna be talking about our favorite TV spots from the Super Bowl 2025. So congratulations to the Eagles. And it was actually a pret. It was a pretty great game unless you were a fan of the Chiefs. So hope you enjoy this episode. It is Super Bowl 2025. We had a brilliant holiday ad show here in Chicago in December. We brought a group of people together. It was live. We went through our favorite holiday ads and we ranked them and then we heard we ranked them on a scale of 1 to 6. And then we heard from system one how these same spots ranked in the consumer panels that System uses. We had some laughs between the gaps and then we added up the scores and we found who won in terms of who actually picked the spots that got the highest rating. So we're going to do that again here. So super bowl was yesterday. This is being recorded Monday afternoon, February 10th. We've got three great minds on the show with us here today and I'm thrilled to have Andrew Tindall back. Great to have you back, Andrew.

[Andrew Tindall]

Thank you, Ferguson.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

For the first time, we have Jamie McGill who was at the holiday ad special here in Chicago. She's head of strategy at DDB Chicago. Great to have you on, Jamie. Welcome.

[Jamie McGill]

Thank you for having me.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And Stephanie is here. Stephanie A we is her returning. This is her returning slot on the show. She was on our Connections series a Couple of months ago. She's head of connections planning at TBWA Chiat day in Los Angeles. Good to have you back on, Stephanie.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Hey, Fergus. Good to be back.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And of course, so people know that if your agency had a spot in the super bowl yesterday, you are not allowed to include that in your top three spots. So that eliminated instacart for Stephanie. So here's gonna be the flow of this episode. It's gonna start off with each of us sharing our favorite top three spots. We're gonna go for number three, go around everybody for their third favorite, then go around everybody for their second. Go around everybody for their first. What you wan is each of us are gonna explain the spot that we picked in position. We're going to guess how it rated on a scale of one to six for system one, and then Andrew is gonna drop in and tell us how it actually rated. And then we're gonna sort of commiserate or celebrate and debate it. So if somebody shares why they like something, somebody else can kind of share why they also like the two. And we're gonna go back and forth through that as we do it. Now, I tell you, my thought, guys, when I saw the super bowl yesterday was I didn't think there was a great wow spot. I haven't felt a really great wow spot in a long time in the super bowl, maybe five or six years. I didn't feel one again yesterday, but there was a lot of solid work, and for me, I found it tough. I don't know about for you guys, but I found it tough to pick three, because even looking back in it today, I was like, geez, I really should have included that, and back and forth. So I didn't feel there were clear winners, but there was solid work that sort of addressed what I have, which is a number of pet peeves about super bowl ads, which we'll talk about later. But did any of you feel different in terms of what you saw?

[Jamie McGill]

For me, no. I agree. Sort of keeping track of it. Leading up to the game, there were glimmers of like, oh, there might be some really interesting stuff. And I think as a whole, in the body of work, just it didn't have to your point, that wow factor. And I also think it's a tough time to be making a Super bowl ad in America right now, too. Right. So I think there's a lot of playing it safe as well.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So how did it look for you, Stephanie?

[Stephanie A Wee]

Yeah, I felt somewhere I had a hard time narrowing down to threes. Have still debated, had A great debate with my nine year old because we were on two different pages and I discovered we were both gravitating to different types of storytelling. And I was, I was surprised how much. And you'll see this in my top. I really rejected a certain type of storytelling this year, which if I look at the reports, maybe the rest of the industry or the population had a different opinion than I did. But yeah, nothing like, wow, that was it. I missed that. I missed that moment this year.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And one of the things that I noticed and I think this kind of happened, Andrew, when we did it at the holiday Holiday group, there wasn't a lot of overlap between the three of us. It's like we had very different tastes in terms of what we thought were the top two of the nine spots that we're gonna highlight. Only one of them was overlapped between two of us.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah, agreed. I think that's what's also great about the super bowl though, the breadth of use of creativity. So I've recently been writing a newsletter for Semrush and I was trying to put together five kind of, you know, the classic five things, learn from the super bowl or whatever. And I had a bit of an epiphany that I think I'm a British creative snob where I kind of previously have been really leaning into what you see at UK Christmas advertising, character story, kind of really heavily emotional. But then this year, looking at the super bowl spots, there's loads of other ways to impress and emotionally pulling consumers. And I actually think I'm lucky because I've seen the data. My team stayed up all night testing all the spots of 10,000Americans and it's the strongest Super bowl yet in six years.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

In terms of what?

[Andrew Tindall]

In terms of how our star rating, so how emotional the work is, which will lead for all our research to kind of long term effects. So we can actually see 25% for the first time are 4 and 5 stars where normally we only see like 10%. So from a consumer point of view, it's a really impressive set of super bowl ads this year.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

I do think that. And I don't know if you see this. Jamie ddb, part of that whole network, Adam and Eve DDB in London, amazing creative effectiveness. We're seeing that the recipe for success and effectiveness and impact is being internationalized far more than it used to be. Whether it's Binet and Field, whether it's Byron Sharp, whether it's some voices here in the us whether it's System One. It is, it is get the word is getting out there. It seems to be that the conversations are changing and as a result, maybe the work is changing.

[Jamie McGill]

Yeah, I would say so. I mean, I think, you know, there was always a push for amazing creativity as there still is today. But I think at least on some of the clients that I, that I have a hand in and you know, the conversation is much more about prioritizing that effectiveness. And as we know, with great effectiveness also comes great creativity in most cases.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Why don't we jump in to our sort of the top, our three, our number three. How do I figure this out?

[Andrew Tindall]

Is it worth. In case someone didn't see our Christmas holiday episode, is it worth quickly explaining what the score is so that we can.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, go ahead.

[Andrew Tindall]

So very quickly we show the super bowl spots to 150 normal Americans. What's key about this is they're not marketers or creatives. So it's about the customer. And we measure their branded emotional response so whether they can recall what brand the ad was for. And I'm sure we'll get into this, but there's a bit of a branding issue in super bowl spots, I think, and the data says, which goes hand in hand with our addiction to celebrities. So we understand kind of how branded the work is, but then also the emotional response. So we understand emotional engagement, which feeds kind of our short term metrics. Is it grabbing attention, is it landing the right message? And then our star rating is the overall emotional response, how positive people are left feeling and not negative or neutral towards work, which we've shown predicts long term effects. And it's between technically 1 and 5.9. The highest you can score is 5.9. That's going.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

The other thing to keep in mind is that what we're going to be hearing from Andrew is the response to the ads that does not necessarily reflect the response to the full initiative. So the things that are happening on social, the things that are happening away from the screen are not necessarily reflected in this. And we get that before people start complaining. It's evaluating the ads itself and it's evaluating on a limited number of exposures, like a single or second. There's two exposures, I think in the testing. Why don't we start off. Stephanie, can we start off with you and let's do your third most popular or your third. How do I say that? The number three for you. I'll say number three.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Okay. Man. I feel like I'm divulging my creative. Like I don't Know, my creative taste, my humor. I don't know. My number three was Coors.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yes.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Case of the Mondays. I, you know, I just thought it was so fun and clever and, you know, because, I don't know, I'm just a cynic. I want to not like the beer ads because I'm like, oh, they're always here. But I really enjoyed it. I just thought the cycling scene, the people at work, just the things that they pulled in of how you experience where you still want to get going on a Monday. But the sluggishness from the food, from just the energy of the day, the drinks. I thought it was so clever, a clever take on the case of the Mondays being their case. Now, I didn't follow the rest of the campaign. I'm not exactly sure all of the elements that they've added in, and not that it matters with the scoring, but I just thought it was a really, really fun take on the role of beer that it can and serve the day after.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

As we're all experiencing that, I really enjoyed that too. And one of the things I found that was truly unique about that campaign is that it felt like three campaigns in one. I don't know. Jamie, what did you think of it?

[Jamie McGill]

Yeah. So, first of all, I could watch that cycling scene over and over. It makes me laugh every time I saw it. But I agree.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

What was the cycling scene? Remind me of that.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Like they're trying to go in. Yeah. Full cycle type thing and.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Oh, the sloth. The sloth, yeah. On the bike. Got it. So, sorry, go ahead.

[Andrew Tindall]

I preferred the police chasing them. That was funnier. No. Yes.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Yes.

[Jamie McGill]

There's a lot of great students in that spot. I think what they did, what. What Coors Light did a great job of is they had this universal insight. Right. It's got this big idea of the, you know, case the Mondays. And if you saw the teaser work, the teaser work had nothing to do with sloth, but it's still very much encapsulated, like, what it's like when you're really struggling on a Monday. Right. So it was kind of different stories, all laddering up versus sort of taking that sloth idea and pulling it through into everything that they surrounded the game with.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, I felt that exact way, too. I thought it was really well done. It's Mischief usa and, yeah. So it started off with that misspelled billboard in Times Square. Then it became a piece on the actual pack itself of the product. Then it became slots in a spot. Then it became there was some other element I can't recall right now, but it was really sort of a very different way of almost having three different ways of coming into the same problem. And it's made it seem a little, a little less typical as a, as a beer spot. I love that. What, what do you think it's scored as Stephanie, scale of 1 to 5.9?

[Jamie McGill]

I don't.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Okay, I'm gonna go with a 4. I feel like people enjoyed it. I don't know. I don't know. You know, I have nothing to gauge what gets a 5 or a 5.9, so I'm gonna go with a safe 4.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

4 out of 5.9.

[Andrew Tindall]

1% of advertising globally is a 5. So it, you have to be like, it has to be the spot you turn up and think about, wow, that mind just kind of reference.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Okay, so what did it do, Andrew? And what, what was your thoughts?

[Andrew Tindall]

So my thoughts are it speaks to why you do a Super bowl ad. So, you know, all those other elements are a Super bowl ad has to be to drive fame for a brand. If, if it's not that, you might as well put your 8 million into TikTok and get reach there. It's not about the watch in the ad. It has to be about getting people to talk. That's why you're paying a premium for this water cooler moment. I think it's a really good example of that. And the ad itself gets in the top 20% of all beer ads we've ever tested. And it's a three star. So it's a solid ad. It got three.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Got three. Three stars.

[Andrew Tindall]

3.0. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

That's. Wow, that surprises me.

[Andrew Tindall]

It's middle of the pack with this year and I said it's a really big strong year. What's interesting as well, the cause light work is only 80% of the viewers knew it was for Coors light because the pack change and it was kind of all reliant on seeing some of the work before and then the reveal at the end. So 20% of people weren't actually sure what beer brand it was for, which I found really interesting.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

All right, that's pretty damn great though. That surprises me that because I think that the issue of attribution is a huge problem in the Super Bowl. So 80% wrecking recognizing it. I'm like all over that.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah. I mean you've also got, as I said, all this quantum research and testing always has to put into context. That's. So we've asked someone to watch it and ask them Straight afterwards what brand it was for when you and your mates are on the couch eating wings, drinking beer. You've probably had a few that 80 might be slightly lower in, in real life, Right?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah. That's fair. All right, Jamie, what was your. What was your number three?

[Jamie McGill]

So my number three was Mountain Dew, Kiss from a Lime. And to me, it was just the ad I needed. Like, it just made me laugh. I. I watched a teaser last week and I was like, oh, Seal was obviously coming into this somehow, but it, it delivered more than I thought it would by sort of having Seal in that ad. And I just thought the craft of it and the timing and everything and the extended version, I love the self awareness. It just gave me a laugh. And I think that's exactly what we need right now.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah. And that was goodbye. And it's funny in the actual spot itself. I think that's the point you're making, Jamie, is that it actually admits that it doesn't even know what the hell the spot's about itself, right?

[Jamie McGill]

Yes. That doesn't make any sense, I think they say at the end. But I also would say in. It's for a new product. Right. It's a new sort of variety of that Baja sort of line. And it's amazing if you go back and you listen to this song, like the product, they're just talking about the product the entire time, but you don't feel like it's very heavy handed.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

One of the things that I think is a challenge in all of these super bowl spots, and maybe it's not the reality for everybody, but sometimes it's like you feel like this celebrity comes first and then the agency is like, oh, shit, we've got to use Seal now. I got to develop an idea around Seal or around Matthew McConaughey. And then the idea just seems like it obviously came second. But in this. I'm not sure where it came out in this particular spot, but it was fun. Okay, what do you guess it actually scored us?

[Jamie McGill]

Well, if I learn one thing from being in the audience in Chicago is that I'm definitely going to get this wrong, but I'm going to give. I'm going to give mountain dew a 2.6.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So that's interesting. So one of your, your, one of your favorite spots is rating pretty low. So then what makes it your favorite if it's. You think it's a low scoring ad?

[Jamie McGill]

I just thought the entertainment factor was just like spot on. I personally enjoyed it quite a bit. The absurdity. But I just don't know that it would test really strong. But again, I will probably be wrong.

[Andrew Tindall]

I've been at System three years and I get it wrong every day still. So I mean, that's the power of the consumer. I have been singing this at my boyfriend for a week now. It's my favorite ad as well. I think it's addictively good and I think I was talking about, I was being a bit of a creative snob, especially about previously super bowl years and rejecting over ideas of creativity. And I've opened my eyes this year. I call this extreme lateral thinking or I'll affectionately call it feral advertising. So it's like, you know, Baja Blast has a lime in, takes you to a tropical paradise. Maybe there's a seal and it's actually a seal singing a musical version of how it makes you feel. So look, Fergus, in terms of the scores, the longer version got a 3.3, but then the. And it's incredibly high spike. Like the thing is it polarizes the entire audience. 20% hated it. Which I think is the point. Like this whole idea is as you said, there's an innovation, there's two jobs of innovation. You can either have an evolutionary innovation which is kind of like a flavor, a little incremental gain. And the job there is to inject excitement. But all we can have revolutionary, which is like AI, which I'm sure we're going to get onto. And the job there is to inject familiarity here we needed to inject excitement and that was the job. However, the 32nd that they ran on the day was a 1.9. It didn't quite have as much of the magic in that the full spot had. And for some reason it got more of those people to be more of the angry people to lean in and go, I actually don't like this. But yeah, I think it's a 1.9 technically, but it's like super high on our spike rating, which is predictive shots, effects. It grabbed attention, it polarized the audience, which I think is why Jamie, you love it, right? It had a. It had a point of view.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

But who do you think the audience is for that spot? Is it. Is it fair to say that it's a younger audience that are. That with that humor and that more abstract concept tends to work better.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yes. So again, my partner's on TikTok all day long and apparently this is a viral TikTok song at the moment and that's where the idea came from. So I guess it's leaning into the Mountain Dew audience.

[Stephanie A Wee]

I'M definitely not the audience. I think I'm in that 20% who. And you know, as an advertising professional, I feel horrible saying that because people spend so much time working on these. But the absurdity just doesn't. Just doesn't do it for me. Unless that would have been Jason Momoa up front, which I had to like look closely to see is it him? Is it not him? Until I figured out it wasn't him driving the boat.

[Andrew Tindall]

Well, the Mountain Dew dude, he's like a character for the brand, I think. Right?

[Jamie McGill]

I think so. He did see a big part.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Over my head.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So I think that whole theme of knowing your audience goes to my number three. My number three was Liquid Death, the drinking on the job. And the reason it worked for me, I always loved one of the early spots, which was Breaking the Law, where it played off the fact that the can looks like a beer can, a tall boy beer can. And so the shock of thinking that your kid is drinking a beer at their Christmas party at your parents house was like this shocking moment that made you sort of rethink what the hell's going on. Then you hear later in the spot that it's actually water. And I felt like that was one of the early spots. And then of course, as we all know, Liquid Death went into a bunch of bizarre places conceptually and in their humor. And I wondered whether this is a return to that sort of purer idea of knowing your audience and creating sort of scenarios that are relatable to a mass audience in the super bowl versus being more juvenile in its humor. And I just wonder whether that's part of their strategy is looking for that broader audience and going back to some of that more some of those truths which were perfect. So for those who haven't seen it, the spot opens up with the soundtrack about drinking on the job. So you see a pilot chugging what looks like a can of beer, a surgeon, a judge, a cop, a school bus driver. And you're wondering in your mind you're like, why are they saying that it's okay to drink on the job? And then of course it cuts to Liquid death. I mean, you see the brand featured throughout the entire spot. But I like that enough. I like that a lot. I like the purity of coming back to that idea. So that would be. That would be my number three now in terms, I'm like Jamie here because I don't think that scored all that high. I just liked the strategic role that it played. And so I'm going to guess it was like a 2.2, very close.

[Andrew Tindall]

So it knows its audience and it's not everyone, really. That's kind of the whole strategy. It's actually a 1.6. It's our first one. And Asli could definitely because so obviously I'm from the uk. They've just pulled out of the uk. It's a brand that is very interesting to a lot of marketers and it's doubling down that strategy that it looks like a beer, which is. It's not Evian or Smart Water. It's not water for everyone. It has its target. And unfortunately in the testing you saw a lot of people, which I guess is a strategy. Hate that spot. Which gave it a really high spike rating because it got loads of kind of emotional engagement and people paying attention. But did it leave people feeling great about Liquid Death, which kind of, you know, is how brands kind of grow in years and years to come normally, not. Not so much.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

God, I wonder if. I wonder if you're able to slice that data and look at the. Those who have been exposed to the brand before versus those or have used it and those who have never used it. Who would make any difference that that could be. I just. I just wonder about that, whether there's anything in that.

[Andrew Tindall]

I reckon it'd be like a five star for their core audience. Right. Like, I feel like they've got their. Their fans. They know who they're talking to.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah. And of course their fans are not who they want to reach.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Yeah. Anyone who works, you know, we. We hold up Liquid Death all the time is like gold standard for staying true to their position, who they're going after, how they show up and disrupt. So, you know, it was an honorable mention for me as well. Forgets I had a hard time not putting my top three. But I'm exposed to and I love what they do. So it hit really well with me.

[Jamie McGill]

It's funny, I feel the same way. Like, I love that brand for who it is. It really has a point of view and it sticks to it. But because I know all the activity that brand does, I thought the, the ad was pretty tame.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Right.

[Jamie McGill]

I was like, that's that, like that's a little safe. And honestly, it has to be to your point, Fergus, for this mass aud. Right. So you can't go into some, some of the more, you know, vile ideas that they've done in the past. But it surprised me for its safety versus, you know, really pushing the limits.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah. I think it's a fair comment. So round one, Stephanie won 3.0. You were the winner of the first round. Oh, no, no, wait, wait. Sorry. Jamie won. Oh, no, wait.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Oh, right.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

No, no, no, no, no, no, you didn't.

[Andrew Tindall]

I'm wrong.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

It was Stephanie, because actually you got the. The in game spot was a 1.9 set of a 3.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

[Jamie McGill]

This is an important distinction. Are we being judged based on just this, the spot that ran.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yes.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Or the percent. The. The point difference from our guest to the actual score?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, yeah, that's right. By the margin.

[Jamie McGill]

Yes, the margin.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

We actually could have done it that way too, but maybe next time.

[Andrew Tindall]

I think on that Liquid desk before we kind of move on. I think the exact. One of my favorites because, you know, we talk about the role of what super bowl within the. Within the media mix, within our plan. We've talked about how it needs to grab fame and the other side of it is like just kind of charm. Who's watching the Super Bowl? I think one of my favorite spots is the complete opposite of the Liquid Death spot, and it's the Haagen Dazs spot.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, that was pretty great.

[Andrew Tindall]

You know, that was just kind of like it's such a rare emotion to play into, but sensory pleasure, you know, the luxurious drawer of the ice cream comes out the pack and it's about taking life slow. And it was, it in. In some ways it was. It wouldn't normally stand out, but within the environment where everyone's just kind of aggressively attacking you with very large ideas, I thought that was kind of like a very different way of. Of, of advertising, which I, I really enjoyed. So. Yeah. Yeah.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And of course you have Vin Diesel. Vin Diesel in there too, and it's the whole Fast and the Furious. Yeah.

[Andrew Tindall]

A nice cultural reference.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah. So it really, it seemed to work out pretty good. Good. Okay, let's go around to. For number two. So we'll start this time with Jamie for your number two. And this is one that we shared. Jamie.

[Jamie McGill]

Okay. So I had a hard time deciding if this is my one or two, but the one that I placed as number two when I sent you this list is the Google dream job. Yeah, I mean, Google has done some very simple storytelling in the past. They've done some beautiful storytelling. I thought this was just. Just really emotionally beautiful. I think that insight of being out of work for a while and, you know, trying to. To find your way back into the workforce and the role of the, The AI and the product within that and how that, you know, that assistant really helps you was perfectly integrated and I like the choice of it being a dad. They didn't explicitly say it was someone who had been, you know, as a stay at home parent. But that was the impression I got and I thought that choice of it being a dad was a really nice touch as well.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, I very much enjoyed this but this was actually my number one which means when we go around on number ones I'm gonna have to replace it with one of my honorable mentions. But I love this. I love this because what you say, human stories very well told. It was heartwarming and it was super consistent with the way that Google has always spoke. So it's part of a longer term campaign which is one of my things is and of course I know it's Andrew's one of Andrew's things too, which is consistency for established brands that you want something that's a part of something longer term, not just sort of one offs in the super bowl which too many brands do. And so this has been I think a consistent idea of these types of human truth stories. The other thing that struck me about it was it was sort of like a conversation outside of the conversation that's happening around technology because this was how technology was helpful, it was useful, it was almost joyful as compared to the way we, you know, in popular culture now we're talking about technology which is scary and it's taken over the world. It's threatening and not helpful. I loved the way that they did it and I think it was like really distinctively Google for me. So I think you've got to step in Jamie and score it and I'll just score it too for the hell of it it.

[Jamie McGill]

Okay, this one I wrestled with quite a bit but I, I heard a rumor of the top scoring ad from, from the game which is not on my pick part of my picks but I'm using that to gauge things against. So I'm going to swing from the fences here and give it a 51.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Wow, that's good. I'll give it a 48.

[Andrew Tindall]

I, I know why you've done that Jamie, because one of my. Yeah, it, it's use. Yes. It's leading into emotional storytelling like the our top pick has done. The issue is is AI is hard to sell. Like it's, it's. We're not quite at that mass adoption yet and you know, super bowl mass audience attesting is mass because of that. So it's a 3.1 which is in the top few percent of AI ads. ChatGPT leaned really heavily into how Revolutionary. It is. Google wrapped it in this beautiful emotional story and wrapped it in familiarity, which is an approach to innovation. So yeah, it's a 3.1, but that is one of the best AI ads we've seen in a while.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So why do you think such a wonderful human story only rates a 3.

[Andrew Tindall]

1? Technology is just not that interesting and easy to sell. So like if you were taking the same approach as something like Lays, which is easier to sell and more mass appeal. So Lased is our top scoring spot this year and it was the first super bowl ad that scored 5.9 in six years. So absolutely like off the charts. That is a through and through. What I would call traditional kind of UK Christmas spot. Right. It's hard character, emotional story and it. There's just some categories that are easier to, to sell and advertise and that's why it's always important to kind of benchmark yourself against the category. So you know, know that the Google spot top few percent of kind of AI technology ads. So I think the fact it's a 3.1 is still, is still a triumph in many ways.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

God, I'd be so disappointed to hear that my spot was a 3.1, but that's just me anyway, so let's go next to Stephanie for your number two.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Oh, my number two, Ram Goldilocks. So another cynical side of me also don't like, love the car commercials and the super like, I'm just like, of course they're going to do the thing just like I feel like with the beer. But this one, I don't know, I just really enjoy. Glenn Powell was amazing. Just lots of peaks, I guess, similar to the Coors Light spot. Lots of peaks throughout that story that got me to giggle or laugh and I definitely knew it was a RAM spot at the end.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So yeah, I really enjoy that too. I like that spot a lot. I like the humor of it. I love his expressions when he's exposed to the bears on the left, on the right and then in the backseat between the two kids. That all worked really well for me. And it was sort of that, you know, it's sort of the adrenaline. The adrenaline of a typical sort of a truck spot where it's all about performance. And then it was, you know, played against the humor. I thought worked really well for ram.

[Andrew Tindall]

I think it stands out against a category of average. So like car rides are really bad in general. Too functional, too rational. And then this stands out for doing what Superbowl ads do well. So clever. It's a story, but it's high energy, it will cut through and there's a broadly appealing cultural reference. So we got into a horrible kind of of haul a few for a few years in super bowl where people were leaning into these TikTok kind of trends that I think marketers thought were broadly appealing, but in reality they weren't actually that broadly appealing. So like leaning into Goldilocks, everyone knows that I think is a very smart thing to do.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

It didn't make any of our lists and it came so late in the game. Maybe I was just jaded. But the Jeep spot to me with Harrison Ford could have been really great. I mean because a lot of the those sort of spots back looking back at Chrysler and a lot of the work that they've done, you know, from Paul Harvey spots celebrating the farmer back to Clint Eastwood back to exported from Detroit or whatever it is. That was a brilliant spot in my mind. And how did it do? Andrew, do you happen to have that in front of you? How did the Jeep spot score?

[Andrew Tindall]

I will look for that. Fergus, give me a minute. My favorite. Oh, go on, go on, Jim.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Well, I was going to say I couldn't agree more. To me, that type of storytelling imported from Detroit, halftime America is the pinnacle. And I think also it was at the end of the game I was just, I was not feeling it. I was just like, here we go again. Another one of these, but not yet to the mark.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, I guess it's my cynicism because I think I've got some cynicism in me. But when I saw the frame where it was the World War II jeep. Cause this spot was done in house. It wasn't done by high dive the frame. When I saw that Jeep I was like, oh okay, it's Jeep. And I was sort of like let down. There was a nice, there was a story arc there I thought would have a lot of something nostalgia and all American. There was a story underneath it. But then that commercial, that frame just made it too commercial for me, meaning selling. And therefore I just sort of turned off.

[Andrew Tindall]

The Juice spot's good because we talk about the round spot. It gives us a kind of base to kind of fix ourselves on. So the juice spot was 2.7. So it's. It sits in our kind of bottom half of ads. And then my favorite super bowl spot, which I forgot the car I'd now the car brand, which is ironic is the cat that's pretending that is acting like a dog. It's have you not seen this? I'll have to Google it, but it's a truck ad and the, the cat is essentially acting like a, a dog. It's hilarious. I'll go find the name of it. And then the other one is obviously the, the Jeep Groundhog Day ad, which is a classic. It, that was five star. So that kind of is our range of where we're operating in here.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, really interesting. So did we already score? We didn't score a Ram yet. So let's hear what, what do you think it was, Stephanie?

[Stephanie A Wee]

I'm gonna go with 3.3.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Wow.

[Stephanie A Wee]

I think people enjoyed it.

[Andrew Tindall]

It's. It's a 3.7. It's a highest scoring. Yeah, it's in the top 5% of global car ads for that emotional appeal. It's a really strong spot. Yeah.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

God, it's. You know. You know, the thing is, I don't know if you guys feel this way too, as strategists, but to me, if I came back to my client and said this was a really strong spot and it only scored a 3.6, I'd be like, Jesus, I gotta, I gotta get out of this room because this.

[Andrew Tindall]

Is my job at the moment. Fergus, that's, that's not the case. That's not the case. It's about bench. It's about advertising happens within the context. So a two star farmer ad is brilliant because all farmer ads are one style. Essentially. That's why the Pfizer ad this year is a, is a triumph. Because it's a four star ad. It's absolutely brilliant. And it's about the category uplift.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

But can you really, does that work though? I mean, for me, I'd be like. Because my clients would rarely ever say to me, I want the best car ad. They'd say, I want the best. I want to be amongst the best ads. You know, I'm just giving you a scenario here. So it's 3.3.

[Andrew Tindall]

As advertisers, marketers, creators, planners, we need to take a view from the consumer's point of view. They're not judging you as a car ad to the lay's spot. They're not waking up and they're not at shelf and deciding, am I going to eat Lays, Doritos or Jeep today? That's not how it works. So it's about shifting that view to the consumer and realizing that, yes, it really is. You need to have a look at the category context.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, no doubt.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Well, and just a quick note on your call, out on the Pfizer knock you out spot, one of my Honorable mentions. The one that my child was not happy didn't make my top three because that was at the top of the game from the very beginning that we were benchmarking things again.

[Andrew Tindall]

It got a 4.4. It was absolutely incredible.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So here is my number two. It is from special us and we've had them on the show and we've gone through this. We've had, we've had Uber Eats and Uber on before. And so I loved Uber Eats. I thought that that campaign was terrific. I thought the lead up over the last couple of months has been terrific. I think it's probably one of the best examples of how to use celebrity without celebrity taking over the idea about the celebrity, complementing and building the core idea versus trying to force a storyline in and around the taste of the celebrity. So for me, I thought it was incredibly well branded. I think it's very memorably Uber Eats. And it's interesting that Uber Eats to me looks like the category leader when it's far from that DoorDash has 67% market share. Uber Eats has like 23%. Instacart, I think is around 21%. They're pretty close. But for me, I think Uber just appears like the category leader. It invests a ton of money. I can't even imagine how much they spend on talent. But they firmly believe in their ability to be able to leverage that talent and in leveraging that talent, leveraging their social networks, their own communities. That's part of the value that they say that they get from it. But for me, I loved it. I thought it continues to be sort of endlessly entertaining and I think great that it's part of a long term campaign because that's a huge thing for me with these one off type spots. So Uber Eats, especially us, brilliant work would be my one.

[Jamie McGill]

I would build upon that. I really enjoyed that. That, that spot, I think it was the context of it was perfect for the game and all the references made and sort of the, the Omaha steak scene. Like I. Oh, that's the best, isn't it? That's like the, the sauce on the, on the bikes. Like I could just watch that over and over. Every time I saw it I giggled. And I just also loved Greta at the end. I thought that was just like a perfect little, you know, finale. It was really a fun spot for a Super Bowl.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And what about Kevin Bacon reference? That to me was just phenomenal. And he's on with Greta. He's on the speakerphone. Everybody loves bacon. That was brilliant. Brilliant.

[Andrew Tindall]

Have you guys seen the UK work with Javier Baden, the super villain?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yes.

[Andrew Tindall]

Uber Eats global advertising team are absolutely on fire. Yeah. Really, really strong, strong stuff.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, I love that. What do you think of it, Stephanie? Of course. Let's just qualify this for a second.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Because we have to.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Stephanie. Stephanie's client. Our client. I don't know if you work on them or not, but TBW does. Instacart.

[Stephanie A Wee]

So I worked on the Instacart campaign, so I feel like I can't comment on this one because we're just talking about categories, right?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah.

[Stephanie A Wee]

And so, you know, it's really important as we at Instacart, you know, are challenging. That category is the best way to get your groceries. So it's hard for me to applaud. However, the Omaha sakes, I mean, it doesn't really matter who you are.

[Andrew Tindall]

That was a nice diversion there to go to the Omaha stacks.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

It. Yeah, it really was.

[Jamie McGill]

Yes.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah. And I thought that Matthew McConaughey wasn't his usual indulgent character. I thought he was, like, really generous. And it wasn't about him, it was about the concept and it worked really well. So I'm going to guess that that scored a 4.6.

[Andrew Tindall]

It was another 3.7 here. Ferguson. Similar to the Ram spot. I'm also surprised because it. It's a rare case of using a perf, what I would say perfect use of celebrity, where you wheel them in to feed the idea and you use them for what they're very good for. And also the celebs using that are very broadly appealing, which is what you need at the single spot. So I'm also surprised there as well. However, that makes it some of the top advertising in the category and some of the. The. The best Uber Eats work. So again, it's trying to shift our view from super bowl spots to the category. How interested are we now? Instacart, Scott?

[Stephanie A Wee]

Do we want to go there?

[Andrew Tindall]

Do we want to do it?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yes, absolutely.

[Andrew Tindall]

Because. Because, you know, the best. The best thing you should do is compare your work to your last piece, because that. That's how to show you growing. And also the category. So do we. So we want to know how. What Instacart's got.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, we want to know that we can judge Stephanie.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah. So Instacart was actually 4.1.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Wow.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah.

[Stephanie A Wee]

I mean, the nostalgia of the characters, man, people loved that.

[Andrew Tindall]

It's. It's that it's the 11th highest going spot in the Super Bowl.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

The 11.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah. Yeah. I'm just out of our top 10. And you're right. It's. It's the. It's a. It's a. And it's a Super bowl cultural reference. The fact that we've brought all these characters in, it's a very smart kind of idea. Yeah. And it kind of. It's rooted in salience, which is what I love about it. You know, it's. It's a story about ordering groceries.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So one of the things that I was. That I thought about it, Stephanie and Andrew too, it's like my concern about that spot was, would Instacart get sort of overshadowed by all of the brand characters and would the recall be high enough in terms of brand attribution? Was there?

[Andrew Tindall]

Very good question. And it's one we can only answer with consumer data. Hey, Fergus.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yes, Sir.

[Andrew Tindall]

It gets 87% brand recall for Instacart, which is 10% higher than the average this year. Yeah. So we. Yeah, it doesn't have any brand. I wouldn't say it has a brand recognition issue either, despite every brand in the world being in that spot, which is insane.

[Stephanie A Wee]

And I know we're only talking the ad in the game, but the people you surveyed, I assume were exposed to the last three weeks. And for Instacart, we had a really big pre game effort. We had a lot of content, a lot of. Of press hits, a lot of cameos. And, you know, and so I wonder if that helped with ultimate distribution even when it was just after the spot.

[Andrew Tindall]

Advertising lives within the context. Right. And it's also a good excuse to talk about, you know, brand characters because. And also. Well, actually, we could put this. You should do a whole episode on how that was even allowed and how you, you know, the legality behind getting all that IP into the ad. I would not use that now.

[Stephanie A Wee]

You'll have to silence me because that.

[Andrew Tindall]

That must be insane. But, you know, the power of brand characters, and I was disappointed this year to not see a few turn up. So where was Zach Braff and Donald Faison for T Mobile? Where were they? Where were the Eminem's characters like, well.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Thank God those T Mobile guys are gone. That's all I'll say.

[Andrew Tindall]

You don't know. That was creative excellence. How dare you? You love consistency.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Well, I like good consistency. Not in my mind, bad.

[Andrew Tindall]

Hey, that was forced. It felt so.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

It felt so forced to me.

[Andrew Tindall]

Those, those, those good, Jamie, to help me out here.

[Jamie McGill]

Well, I, I will go back to the Instacart ad because I. Jamie, Jamie, is.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Is. Is T mobile your client or is that in your. Okay, good.

[Jamie McGill]

Thank you. But I think, you know, that ad made such a great case for all brands for brand building for fluent devices. Like, you know, I've worked at, like, I grew up sort of in the Leo Burnett world that created characters all the time back in the day. Right. And I think it's hard to commit to characters and. And sort of a lot of them.

[Andrew Tindall]

Were in the Instacart ad, like the Green Giant. Didn't Leo Burnett invent the green?

[Jamie McGill]

Yeah, so I think it's hard to commit to those type of characters these days with budgets and just what you're able to work with. But I think it's a strong case for why it matters because you instantly saw it and you're like, oh, that's that one, and that's that one, and that's that brand. And so I thought it was a really fun sort of moment as an ad person.

[Andrew Tindall]

And we've got, you know, 50 minutes into this and not talked about the Clydesdale horses as well. So, you know, in terms of characters, the only spot we got this year of 100% brand recognition was the Budweiser spot because of the Clydesdale horses. But you're so right, it's not. We've done some. I've done some new research with the IPA called Compound Creativity, looking at the building of consistency and characters and stuff. And these fluent devices don't pay off until three or four years in. It requires a marketing team to commit a lot of resource and energy. Just getting people to leave your work alone so you can get the job done and you see less and less of it.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

All right, let's go to our number one spots. I'm very curious to hear Stephanie's point of view.

[Stephanie A Wee]

I feel like anyone who's listening to this podcast is going to hate my answer. But listen, I lead connections planning. What we are going after every day is attention. And this ad had everyone in my house glued to the TV being like, what is this a spot for? And that was chatgpt dots. I don't know what we call it.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Well, that was splitting of the cells, the first creation.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Yes. So it was a story arc of innovation, and it broke so many conventions of Super Bowl. It was black and white. It was a simple story. No celebrities, no big emotional or humor. But we were all just like kind of glued to what is this journey we're going on? Where is this going to resolve to. To have an ad that just broke through and got the room's attention? To me was it jumped to the top of my list for what I think it is hard to do in today's landscape. So, so for all those reasons, OpenAI ChatGPT spot was my number one.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

What do you guys think of it?

[Jamie McGill]

You know, that's one that we really didn't get a preview of before the game. And so I think we all were very, very curious on what they were going to do when they got this kind of sort of massive audience and you know, back to the conversation earlier, like they could have gone down a more, more human sort of story to combat sort of the, you know, the conversation around them with AI. But I think what they, what they chose to go a completely different direction. I totally agree with you that it was, it got my entire living room to stop and sort of look at it and say, what is this? So it had that attention grabbing factor. But I, but any.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Could anybody figure it out or were they just sort of questioning it but they didn't actually know what it was about because I was that way. I was like, what the hell is this?

[Jamie McGill]

That's how my house was as well.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah. I couldn't figure it out, Andrew. For me it was like the, it was the antithesis of Google.

[Andrew Tindall]

I'm staying silent.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, it was the antithesis of Google. It felt cold and scientific and dark. Yeah. And for me, I couldn't connect with it at the end. I was like, like the end was the warmest part with the, with the glowing circle because it had color in it. But I watch it again today and now I see what it was about. It was about, it's about innovation throughout history. I didn't get that at all when I watched the spot.

[Andrew Tindall]

System One originally started. Our founder, John Kieran started us as an innovation testing business and we still test innovation and we've talked about it quite a bit. There's a lot of innovations we've seen since Simple. The Baja Blast be one of them nerds. Gummy clusters. AI is the only revolutionary innovation we've seen and it's simple. And we've talked about how, you know, advertising needs to be a rapid familiarity or injecting sidemen. If it's revolutionary, you need to make it familiar and comfortable and human as possible. So it's very different to the Google spots. I completely agree. It is, is completely different. Before we get on to the star rating, which is the emotional, overall emotional appeal, the, the fluency rating because you guys were saying, you know, the brand recognition. Who's this spot for? Unfortunately only 59% of people could recall all it was for ChatGPT. So even after, you know, being forced to watch the atmosphere spot, 40, over 40% of people couldn't attribute that spot back to the super.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And that was after two exposures in your testing, right? Or is it after the first exposure?

[Andrew Tindall]

That is after the first exposure, we take that which is interesting in a.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Clutter reel or independent?

[Andrew Tindall]

No, that is forced exposure. Independent. We're about to show you an ad. Enjoy it. And then the first thing we do is. Who was that for? How did it make you feel?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

All right, drumroll, Stephanie. Okay, first, how do you think it scored?

[Stephanie A Wee]

I'm gonna say it's like a 1.1. I think people watched him, were intrigued. Didn't necessarily, like, even myself, I had to go back and, like, figure out.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So does this mean. Does this mean, Stephanie, that, like, if I'm at a client meeting and you recommend a spot to me, is it gonna be a 1.1 because you love it?

[Stephanie A Wee]

No, because I'm gonna recommend the surround sound campaign that makes sure people know who it's from.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

I love it. I love it.

[Andrew Tindall]

It was a 1.2. You were very clowny.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Oh, man.

[Stephanie A Wee]

I knew it wasn't sore high.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Well, you were spot on. That's the. I think that's the closest so far. Is it something like that? Pretty damn. Hold on. Yeah, it is the closest one so far. Is it possible that they decided in the last week or two to be in the super bowl and they couldn't produce the type of spot they wanted to, so they did one that was more of designed spot than it was something that required shooting an original footage or. I wonder if that would. If there was. If anything like that, because it felt.

[Andrew Tindall]

Like Fergus, did AI make it would be my question.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Oh, there's another. Yeah, yeah, yeah, Great point. Yeah, interesting.

[Andrew Tindall]

That actually would be a really interesting creative idea around, you know, the shot on iPhone and at the end, it could have, you know, made by chat, gbt me. But I don't think it went that far. Did it?

[Jamie McGill]

Yeah, I feel like it was a calculated decision to go very tech with it versus human. Right. And again, this is like, it was a big moment for them, and I. I feel like it didn't happen by accident.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yep. Okay, so, Jamie, your number one, please.

[Jamie McGill]

So my number one again, this was head to head with the Google spot, but. But I went Nike. So when it was great to see Nike back in the game, I think, you know, they had a very clear point of view taking on, you know, an issue that I think, you know, from many of us should be hard to argue with when it's hard to sort of approach some of those, you know, controversial things these days. I also think we're at a really interesting time in our lives with, with female sports, women's sports and, and female athletes. And I, I just love the, the insight behind it. Thought it was really beautifully done and I have an 8 year old daughter at home. So I think for me personally it just sort of hit, you know, hit me emotionally and just like I really appreciated the message of it. It felt very Nike Classic Nike.

[Stephanie A Wee]

I loved seeing the women get the flowers that they deserve. A lot of those women. So another full disclosure, another one of my brands is Gatorade. So a lot of those women are also Gatorade athletes and we get to hear of them as well. The one thing I will say, cause I thought it was beautiful, but Dochi as the vo, I wanted more Dochi. I was expecting more of her in her moment. I think you might not even known that Dochi was the vo.

[Andrew Tindall]

I didn't know that.

[Stephanie A Wee]

And so that was, that was surprising to me that we didn't get more oomph in the vo and especially coming from the voice of, you know, hip hop right now.

[Jamie McGill]

Yeah.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So for me, you know, this is obviously the first spot for Nike in the Super bowl since 1988. I couldn't believe that. So how do you think, Jamie, it scored?

[Jamie McGill]

So having gone through this conversation today, I've changed my score on this one a few times throughout, throughout our chat.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Why?

[Jamie McGill]

I feel like, I don't want to say it's polarizing, but I feel like not everyone might enjoy it the same way and hit this emotion the same way. My latest score is a two.

[Andrew Tindall]

Eight. Jamie. Yeah. So I. Yes. Everything you're saying. Yes. So again, this is with a broad audience, isn't it? It's everyone that saw it kind of. It's a naturally up against the audience who we test with. So it, it's a 3.2. It's in the top 20% of sports science. But you're right, the strategy itself relies on keeping some people out the tent. They need to disagree with some people. That's the whole. That's what Nike has done. And you know, I would say this is a safer point of view to take than some of their previous work, but it's still a point of view. So yeah, it's a 3.2. So still really solid work, but it didn't quite bring everyone along on that journey which it arguably. So again, you need to look at all these results within the context of the plan, the strategy as a brand team and an agency team. You. That doesn't. That confirms probably that it's. It's done what it needed to do. It got a lot of the audience along, but left some of them behind.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

I'm just totting up the scores here to see who won.

[Andrew Tindall]

I am.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

I know the winner.

[Andrew Tindall]

But we haven't done your spot yet, have we?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

No, we haven't. But. But I. I'll explain it. Why.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Why you won by so much. It doesn't even matter.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

No, I didn't win.

[Andrew Tindall]

I don't think you have.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

No, no, I haven't. What I did is because I picked Google Gemini. So that was my number. What? Number one. What was it? Was it my number one? Yeah, it was my number one. And so given that score, in actuality, do we know. Do you want to know who won? Jamie won.

[Andrew Tindall]

I won.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Jamie won. Yes, you won. You got 3.3 in your first round, 3.1 in your second, and 3.2 in your third. Oh, hold on. Well, screwed that up. No, you, because you got a 1.9. You got a 1.9. Yeah.

[Jamie McGill]

Really mess me up.

[Andrew Tindall]

Jamie, you picked Mountain Dew Ramen night, right?

[Jamie McGill]

I'm sorry.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yes, she did.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Gemini Google.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Okay, so it's 1.1point.

[Andrew Tindall]

We should have done a pre poll, so shouldn't we?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

It's 8.2. Okay. You still won. I did, yes. Because it was a 1.9 for the first one. It was a 3.1 and a 3.2.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

That's nine. That's 8.2, right?

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Stephanie got a 7.9 if I'm counting that. Right. And I got an 8.1 if you include Gemini.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah. Oh, Jamie, I agree with those.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

First time on the show and she wins. She shames us.

[Jamie McGill]

I didn't think I was gonna. I did not think I was gonna be a strong, strong contender here.

[Andrew Tindall]

So the trophy is the, the, the championing, the consumer trophy. You've kind of aligned most with what the, the masses think at the Super Bowl. I think that's a, that should proudly sit on your, on your shelf, Jamie.

[Jamie McGill]

And that's the thing, right? As, as ad people, we, we have one view on it, but if you actually put it through the lens of a consumer, they might have a very, very different perspective. And I think that's just the reality.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So, Andre, what did we miss in terms? We've only got a couple. We've only Got a minute or two here. What did we miss in terms of the top five? What were they?

[Andrew Tindall]

Well, you guys really didn't like the top 10 this year, which is. Yeah, it's less. My job is less fun when I talk about the winners. So how did none of you pick the Reese's? Like, what do we not like that? That was a 4.1. But what I love about it is, like, as I said, I'm a full convert. I was a snob. I thought, you know, you had to have a story, you know, traditional character and storyline, heavy emotion.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Oh, you mean a formula. Yes.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Everything we hate. Everything we hate to hear, I would.

[Andrew Tindall]

Say, advertising that puts on a show in a certain way. Whereas, you know, the Reese's work, again, was lateral thinking. The product's called Lava. What if everyone gets so into it they want to eat the lava? And consumers loved it. It was a 4.1.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So what else was in the top five?

[Andrew Tindall]

Okay. Haagen Dazs was number five. Which we talked about. The NFL spot. Again, no one chose the NFL spot.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Wait, which one? Well, I believe, because another honorable mention of mine was the. The NFL spot about big brother, big sisters.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah.

[Jamie McGill]

I love the flag cup.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

All on.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Yeah.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Oh, yeah. That was good. That was good. Yep.

[Andrew Tindall]

Well, so of the top five, that.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Was the coach one. Wasn't. That was not the one where it kicked me, Coach. And then it spun out.

[Andrew Tindall]

Two of them were in the top five. The both NFL spots made it into our top five.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, I mean, they were. They were really good. That's true.

[Andrew Tindall]

Yeah. Yeah. The only issue is so. And again, it's about understanding the strategy behind it. The I am somebody one, which was the highest scoring one. Only 60% of people could recall. It was for the NFL. But I don't know what job is that. I'm trying to do it. I guess it's trying to grow the sport. So does it matter it's for NFL? I don't know. Really? And then we've got the WeatherTech. Do we not like the Weather Tech?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

God, you're kidding me. What number was that?

[Andrew Tindall]

I thought I was a snob. Fergus, come on.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Oh, my God, please. The weather tech. I was confused, but I was like, what is weather? I understand why WeatherTech is there, but I was like. Like, I don't know. I mean, I. I understand they're very product oriented. They're an Illinois brand, by the way, outside of Chicago. Bowling Brook or something like that. They've. And then this is the first time I. I understand They've done a branding spot.

[Andrew Tindall]

Not bad into the emotional.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

I know. It just didn't. It felt like it was a disjointed sort of a thing for me, but anyway, I didn't really pay any attention, tell you the truth.

[Andrew Tindall]

And then I guess.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

I guess they'll never come on my show.

[Andrew Tindall]

I was just gonna say, well, chat. GBC are never going to return my call, so don't worry about it. And the top spot was the lay spot from PepsiCo, which is high dive here in Chicago. Yeah. Do we like this spawn? What's the feeling with you guys?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

There you go.

[Andrew Tindall]

You're gonna have to edit that silence out, Fergus.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Well, no, no, we don't edit.

[Jamie McGill]

It was a nice story. It was very surprising. It was very surprising to see that from Lays in the super bowl, but it's. It was a sweet story.

[Andrew Tindall]

Did you see who directed it?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, Taiki. I can never pronounce it. Same guy who did the. Some of the spots we did for. We did at the Christmas. Christmas proper.

[Andrew Tindall]

Kind of like big.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Super legit. Yeah, super legit.

[Andrew Tindall]

And it worked like 5.9. That's the highest scoring kind of. Of Super Bowl I've seen in six years in terms of broad emotional appeal. And it speaks to what you might call a formula, Fergus. I would call emotional storytelling with character. And also, I was trained at, like, Diageo in marketing. You find a product truth and you ladder it into something emotional.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

I didn't think it was a bad spot. For me, the biggest emotional reaction I had was in the last frame of the spot when you saw the real farming families that bake, that grow potatoes for lays. Because the farm that's featured in that spot is an actual farm, a true family farm. I hope there's more coming. That sort of is implied by that last frame when there's the collage of the families, which I thought was really great. I kind of love that kind of stuff. It's like when you see the end of a movie and the actual character who was in the movie, the real person in real life comes up on the screen, and I'm like, bawling, crying. So I kind of felt that same emotional tug in that last frame. So there we are, people. We did it. We got through the top three. And we have our winner, which is Jamie. I think when we do this in the future, we'll have to come up with a prize that goes to the winner, but thank you.

[Andrew Tindall]

I'll send you to 150 households. Jamie, to shake hands. You're a woman of the people.

[Jamie McGill]

My job. That's my job, right?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

That's right.

[Jamie McGill]

Won't get fired today, so thanks for solidifying me as a strategist.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

It is Jamie McGill, head of strategy at DDB Chicago. It is Stephanie A Wee, head of Connections Planning at TBWA Chiatay in Los Angeles. And it is the early morning in Sydney, Australia, right now. Andrew Tindall, SVP Global Partnerships. That's System One. He's out of London. Normal, and a great friend of the show. Thank you all for being a part of this.

[Jamie McGill]

Thanks so much.

[Andrew Tindall]

Thanks, Pegasus.

[Stephanie A Wee]

Thank you.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And we will see everyone on the next episode.