Super Bowl Marketing Strategy: The Perks of Using Digital Out-of-Home (DOOH)

Super Bowl LVII is gaining some serious traction from marketers— as of early September, Fox is nearly sold out of its commercial inventory. Whether or not your brand decides to spend $6-7 million on a Super Bowl ad this year (yes, those are record-high prices), there are other effective and cost-efficient ways to tap into the big game’s traffic.

Digital out-of-home (DOOH) advertising is a very accessible channel that gives brands a unique opportunity to reach their audience before, during, and after the Super Bowl.

In this article we’ll talk about the importance of DOOH’s in-person impact, and the top three ways it can help add value to your Super Bowl campaigns.

So, why should you add DOOH to your game plan?

DOOH combines an engaging in-person experience with the ease of your usual digital marketing campaigns. When it comes to football season, consumers are constantly out and about. In fact, 67% of Americans planned to spend money during last year’s season.

Whether they're going to the grocery store to pick up food and drinks before game night, prepping for a get-together at a friend’s house, going to the mall to buy new jerseys, or meeting at a sports bar for a watch party— there are many opportunities for brands to connect using DOOH networks.

By adding this real-world touchpoint to your Super Bowl campaigns, your brand is more likely to build recognition among consumers and stay top of mind throughout the season (and beyond).

3 ways DOOH can make your campaign a winning play

1) Pair DOOH with your other channels

Odds are you’ll be using a type of multi-channel or omnichannel approach leading up to the Super Bowl, and DOOH is great for boosting the effectiveness of other platforms.

When used together, marketing channels can complement each other and make up for what others may lack. Here are a few strategic pairings with DOOH:

• • DOOH can increase reach by up to 316% for mobile advertising and 212% for social media campaigns.
• • DOOH can drive 4 times more online search and social media activity per ad dollar spent than TV, radio, or print.

In 2019, Frito-Lay partnered with Grocery TV to launch their new product, Doritos Flamin’ Hot Nacho, and increase brand awareness during the Super Bowl. They were able to reach 1.1 million customers and see a 146.8% growth in our stores during the campaign.

Plus, because of the digital nature of DOOH, your brand can easily activate it through various programmatic platforms— which will make the entire process from initial planning to performance tracking much more seamless.

2) Optimize when and how you reach your audience

Similar to online campaigns, it’s important to consider what days or times would be best to run your DOOH ads. Which moments will be the most relevant and effective leading up to the big game?

On Grocery TV, for example, we can see a clear foot traffic increase in our supermarkets leading up to Super Bowl weekend. But you could also make the most of other key game days during the season as well as specific times that your audience is more likely to be active.

When it comes to how you’re reaching consumers, DOOH gives you plenty of room to make tailored creative based on audience demographics and other experiences/preferences. Will you be running campaigns for a primarily Spanish-speaking community? Are there certain football-related phrases commonly used in your target DMAs?

Adjusting your content according to the types of language or imagery that best speaks to your audience can really boost your brand’s impact.

3) Use contextual creative

In case you haven’t heard much about contextual DOOH, it basically means preparing content that can be used depending on variables such as special events, locations, traffic, weather, flight statuses, etc. When consumers come across contextually relevant creative, they're more likely to gain interest and interact with your brand.

One study shows that contextual creative helps promote engagement and can boost campaign effectiveness by 17%. What does this type of campaign look like in action?

If you were to run an ad on Grocery TV, it’d be best to speak to both the location (supermarket) and the upcoming event (could be the Super Bowl, a playoff game, etc.).

Let’s say a clothing brand wants to promote a new collection— their creative could feature a family going out to pick up food for a playoff watch party at their house. The ad gets to show off the new clothing items while also relating to football fans as they shop for groceries.

What are your Super Bowl LVII plans?

With so much competition out there for visibility, we hope this gave you some ideas on how to break through the noise.

Our DOOH network, Grocery TV, can be found in supermarkets across the country. If you’d like to learn more about launching campaigns with us, please feel free to reach out!

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