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As we have done for the last several years, we will chime in with our thoughts on this year's Super Bowl ads. While the Super Bowl is arguably the most watched television show of the year and does have broad appeal across demographics and geography, we found some interesting posts from people "not planning on watching the Super Bowl." As you might expect, most of them were from outside the U.S. where football is actually another sport altogether. And that version of football may be a better venue for some advertisers looking to get to an international audience.

Regarding the ads themselves, we have a mixed bag. Most of us felt that the ads themselves are continuing to be less interesting. Maybe we're jaded, but our fellow watchers had the same comments. You might argue that the super hype makes expectations difficult to meet, but as we heard at least one pundit say before the game, "the Super Bowl is probably the only television show where ratings would decrease were it not for the commercials."

As we have said in prior Super Bowl revues, to rate the ads it is important to know the purpose of the ad. And, as usual, the advertisers did not invite us to their strategy meetings, so we have to draw our own conclusions. We assume that the two primary purposes are either to induce trial (get the watcher to try the product or service) or create a continued attachment to the brand/company.

Budweiser fits in both categories and is always a major advertiser on the program. We feel their Bud ads are well done to create a continued emotional attachment and this year's "Rocky" themed Clydesdale ad was typical. Their Bud Light ads, which we assume are designed to induce trial, left some of us unimpressed. From the fire breathing ad at the beginning to the flying ad later, these "no longer available benefits" to drinking Bud Light, seemed lame to us. However, some of the other audience members found them entertaining. However, entertainment does not necessarily lead to action.

The Audi R8 (which looks like a really cool car) had an add that we think didn't work. If you didn't see The Godfather, or didn't remember that particular scene, the ad made no sense. Why limit your audience in that way?

All the guys liked the Victoria's Secret ad, but that's not a surprise. Will it induce action, hard to say. We suggest they could have taken a clue from the Go Daddy folks, who seem to get it right each year. (Their goal is to drive traffic to their site where they can try to sell you on using their services.) This year their ad was banned from the Super Bowl, so they ran an ad telling you that you could see the ad on their website. We suspect they had a LOT of hits. (And once you see the ad, you'll know why there was no way the U.S. censors were going to let that one on the air.)

The other company we felt did a good job of entertaining and delivering a message was Career Builder, though their "heart" ad did gross out many women watchers. The Coke ads (especially the balloons) seemed to be a hit with some people as well.

At the end of the day, at $2.6M per spot plus production costs, we hope (though we wonder) the companies involved had a set of objectives for their ads; that those objectives tied to overall business objectives; and that they have a way to determine if those objectives were met. Otherwise its just marketing spend, not marketing investment.