Adbowl Ramps Up Site for Super Sunday

http://www.technologymarketing.com/mc/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=2076619

Two out of every five people who will watch this year’s Super Bowl tune in for the commercials. At least that’s according to a survey of 500 Americans conducted by the marketing research firm InsightExpress.

But for some, merely watching the ads is too passive. For the fourth year running, advertising fans McKee Wallwork Henderson (MWH) of Albuquerque will be taking its Adbowl.com Web site live during the football championship. Viewers can judge commercials interactively, and at the end of the game the site will announce “America’s favorite ads.”

“Two years ago, the Adbowl was basically an industry event,” said MWH president Steve McKee. “Last year, we took it more public. This year, we don’t know quite what to expect, but we’ve beefed up the infrastructure to handle hundreds of thousands of votes.

“We’ve also made it easy for many people to vote from a single computer, since this is a party thing,” added McKee. However, “no one can game the results by voting multiple times.” Last year, more than 167,000 people voted, with FedEx’s “Castaway” commercial winning first place and Budweiser’s “Clydesdale Instant Replay” coming in second.

Asked about this year’s potential winners, McKee noted: “Annheuser-Busch is buying plenty of spots, and they can be counted on to rank in the top 10 of the Adbowl. Staples is also in the game, along with H&R Block — I understand they’re bringing back Willie Nelson — and so is Procter & Gamble with a Charmin spot. I don’t know how well it’s going to do in Adbowl, but they’re going for it and you have to give them credit.”