Press Release

Budweiser and Doritos Dominate List of Last Five Years’ Most-Liked Super Bowl Ads; Automotive Represents the Biggest Category; Ads Improve—and Lengthen— Over Time

LOS ANGELES, CA.—January 21, 2016—Ace Metrix®, the leader in measuring the impact of video advertising, today released the 25 most-liked Super Bowl ads of the last five years. Budweiser dominates the list, producing six of the top ads, including the top three overall. Led by its 2014 60-second “Puppy Love” ad with a Likeability score of 8311, the brand’s 2013 “Brotherhood” (804) and 2015 “Lost Dog” (802) closely follow.

“The King of Beers has earned another crown by becoming the King of Super Bowl advertising through the creation of ads that so effectively appeal to the largest, most demographically diverse TV audience in the world,” said Peter Daboll, CEO of Ace Metrix. “As Super Bowl ads have evolved in tone, length and appeal from some of the iconic ads of yesteryear, comparing ads from the last half decade to those older legends is no longer apples-to-apples. Brands today have to think about the life of their ad prior to and beyond television with the proliferation of digital distribution and social media.”

Doritos followed Budweiser with five of the most likeable ads of the last five years. The brand’s groundbreaking “Crash the Super Bowl” contest, entering its tenth and final year, gave validity to crowdsourcing ads and has produced Super Bowl success year after year. Interestingly, the top likeability scorer from the contest was 2012’s “Slingbaby” (785), with ads from 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2015 making the list of most-liked ads.

The automotive category, a perennial top Super Bowl spender, had four ads on the list from brands Toyota, Bridgestone, Mercedes and Bridgestone. Other categories with multiple ads on the list include candy, represented by M&Ms and Snickers, and soda, with one from Coca-Cola and two from Pepsi.

“Every advertiser on this list should be highly commended for achieving creative gold and shaping the future of advertising,” Daboll commented.

Top 25 Most Liked Super Bowl Ads, 2011-2015:

Super Bowl Ads Are Getting Longer. And Better.

Over the last five years, Super Bowl ads have become progressively longer, as well as more effective. In 2011, twenty percent of Super Bowl ads were 60 seconds or longer, and the average Likeability score was 649. In 2015, 43 percent were longer than 60 seconds, and the average Likeability score was 659. During the same period, the average overall Ace Score jumped from 568 to 613, giving credence to the concept that longer story arcs can be more attention-grabbing and effective. On the most-liked list, nearly half of the ads are 60 seconds.

Super Bowl Themes are Changing
The most-liked ad list demonstrates the overwhelming shift from humor to inspiration, sentimentality, and patriotism that we’ve seen over the past five years. The span of 2011 to 2015 saw a 13 percent decrease in the use of humor in ads and a 19 percent increase in the use of inspirational messaging. Microsoft’s two ads, 2014’s “Empowering” and 2015’s “Braylon O’Neill” are prime examples, as is Budweiser’s 2014 salute to veterans, “Hero’s Welcome,” which demonstrates a shift to ads appealing to national pride.

The Super Bowl’s Digital Expansion, 2011-2015
In the course of the past five years, more and more brands are using their Super Bowl ads as part of an overall event, rather than a “one-and-done” investment. The number of ads released ahead of time, either on social media or through teasers, has gone from 8 percent in 2011 to 61 percent in 2015. Additionally, the number of ads that include a social component within their message has gone from 8 percent to 51 percent over the same period.

Ace Metrix and the Super Bowl
Since 2010, Ace Metrix has analyzed all TV ads that have run during the Super Bowl. Ace Metrix CEO Peter Daboll, one of the foremost experts on Super Bowl advertising and author of “Ad-itude: Using Data to Inspire Extraordinary Ad Creative,” is available for interviews about Super Bowl ads. Chapter 12 of “Ad-itude” entitled “Super Super Bowl Ads” is available for a limited time here. For an interview or information about past or present Super Bowl ads, please contact us.

About the Ace Score
The Ace Score is the measure of ad creative effectiveness based on viewer reaction to national TV and online video ads, providing the advertising industry an unbiased resource to measure creative impact. Ace Metrix scores every national television and the majority of digital video ads, across 96 categories creating a complete comparative database—Ace Metrix LIVE®. A unique panel of at least 500 consumers, representative of the U.S. TV and Internet viewing audience, scores each ad in the exact same manner. The results are presented on a scale of 1–950, which represents scoring on creative attributes such as Persuasion, Likeability, Information, Attention, Change, Relevance, Desire and Watchability. Ace Metrix applies a natural language processing algorithm to the hundreds of qualitative verbatim responses collected for each ad, deriving a score that indicates positive, negative or neutral emotional impact and represents the ad’s position on an Emotional Sentiment Index ranging from 1–100.

About Ace Metrix
Ace Metrix® provides technology, tools and insights that enable the advertising ecosystem to understand how and why video creative works with viewers. Advertisers, agencies and publishers rely on Ace Metrix to provide qualitative and quantitative measures, normative data and competitive insights that inform each phase of the creative lifecycle, resulting in advertising that consistently delivers results. The Company’s comprehensive suite of tools map to ad objectives, including the creative impact of persuasion, breakthrough, emotional connection, and indicators of shareability. The Company is privately held and is backed by leading venture capital firms and industry leaders including Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, Palomar Ventures, Leapfrog Ventures and WPP.

[1] The Likeability Score is one component of the overall Ace Score, which is the measure of ad creative effectiveness based on viewer reaction to national TV and online video ads, providing the advertising industry an unbiased resource to measure creative impact. The results are presented on a scale of 1–950. More information about the Ace Score and research methodology can be found below.

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PR Contact: Michelle Robertson | 646-279-5775 | michelle@kerlancomm.com
Dori Busell | (917) 689-3415 | dori@kerlancomm.com
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