60% of the most shared Super Bowl ads of all time were launched before Super Bowl Sunday, and this year, YouTube are going to let you catch some of the ads lined up for this years big event before they go to air. The site has launched their new AdBlitz Channel which currently offers 9 teasers including ads from Doritos, Squarespace, Pepsi and Butterfinger, although many others are expected.
In the years before social media ruled the world, Super Bowl ads were confined to the game itself. Now advertisers have to create a buzz around their content by either releasing the commercial, or teasers about it, earlier and earlier. Lucas Watson, vice president for brand solutions at Google, confirmed that:
"What used to be a one-day event, with some post game water-cooler chat, is now an 8 to 13-week experience. As a result, major advertisers are trying to win the conversation before the game, as well as during and after."
Super Bowl ads are big news on YouTube. In 2013, more than 3.2 million hours worth of ads were uploaded to the site and views of those ads grew around 2.6x compared to the previous year. Super Bowl commercials were watched more than 265 million times last year, and game day ads that were released prior to Super Bowl 2013 attracted approximately 3.4x more views than ads released on the actual Sunday.
As well as offering users the chance to watch, vote on and share their favorite commercials, YouTube's new AdBlitz channel is offering playoff analysis from Fox Sports, and other custom content like animated gifs, an interactive game, and a hashtag search function.