As the readership of this blog is largely small to medium-sized business owners, I highly doubt many of us have the marketing budget to air a Super Bowl ad. But — hear me out on this — what if you could? (photo: Bud Light)
What if an NBC executive called you to say that a major advertiser dropped out and he pulled your name out of the phonebook and decided to give you a free 30-second spot?
Not very plausible, I know. But say it happened. What would you do? More importantly, what would you say with your 30 seconds of national exposure?
Now, I fully understand that a well-targeted direct mail campaign would serve most of you better. But this is a thought-experiment, not a practical exercise. I want you to really think about how you would, in 30 seconds, tell the world about your business and why they need it.
Many super bowl ads are purchased by huge companies interested in nothing more than brand-building and getting consumers to buy more of their product — a cheap laugh here, scantily-clad women there — but for YOUR business, this is the opportunity to inform (basically) all of America about what you have to offer.
So, how would you do it?
This may seem like a fanciful exercise, but you would be surprised how often the information you deem important enough to be in your fake Super Bowl ad is absent from your actual marketing promotions.
And that, my friends, is a crying shame. Sometimes it takes a new perspective to help us separate the nice from the necessary in our marketing messages.
So let me hear it. What would your 2012 Super Bowl ad have looked like??
Dream on,
Shaun
