My post game analysis

Yesterday, I wrote about my favorite Super Bowl spot, "Farmers" for Ram. While there is some controversy about the origin of the idea and whether the agency or Ram should have credited the original video somehow, as long as Farms.com gave their permission and were compensated fairly, I'm okay with it.

Now on to the rest of the spots.

My favorites in no particular order:

Tide

Fun story, tied nicely to the game, nice demonstration of the product benefit. People think you can only do great ads for cars and beer. P&G and their agencies consistently prove that wrong.

Mercedes

Nice twist on an old story. I'm a sucker for that song and unlike Landslide on the Bud Clydesdale spot, it actually adds to the concept. I'm not sure I would have put the car on the track – a gratuitous nod to performance – but I guess a lot of guys fantasize about that, too. I like the reveal at the end. It's a smart, well-crafted ad, designed to address the perception that Mercedes are unaffordable.

Taco Bell

Fun, well done, easy to like. Great music. Yeah, Pepsi did a similar concept in 1990. But this works.

Audi 

I didn't like this spot at first but it's grown on me. Audi to me is all about inspired engineering and technical superiority. As I was driving my A4 Quattro through the snow yesterday I realized that the benefit of that feature is confidence. And that's what this spot is all about.

Volkswagen

I like it for the same reason I like Audi, it sells the ultimate benefit of the car. You can't drive a Beetle and not smile. And no, contrary to what the perpetually offended will have you believe, showing people of different races speaking with a Jamaican accent is not racist. 

And now onto my least favorites...

Budweiser

Here's a sappy, predictable story about a boy and his horse. Now, drink a beer. Oh and maybe you'll like this irrelevant song we put behind the video. I know I'm in the minority here, but it's my blog, so there!

Doritos

Ignore your child unless she offers you a tasty snack, then cross dress. Can we please stop the consumer-generated ideas? They're way to cliche, predictable and do nothing to sell the actual product.

Budweiser Black Crown

I can't think of a group of people I'd less rather drink an ordinary beer with than this crowd. 'nuf said.

GoDaddy

This spot is so bad, I'm not even going to embed it. If you really must punish yourself by watching it, click this link. I moved all my accounts from GoDaddy to another host last year specifically because their advertising was so bad. I was talking to a guy yesterday who has thousands of domains registered through them and said he would move if he didn't have to hire three people full-time to make it happen. The people at GoDaddy will talk about all the buzz they generated, but just like Groupon a few years ago, they'll find out that bad buzz is a lot worse than no buzz at all.

Obviously there were a lot more spots. And a lot of good ones – Sketchers, Hyundai, Oreo, Jeep, M&Ms – and a lot more bad – Calvin Klein, the CBS Promos, Kia, Samsung, etc. – but these are the ones that stood out for me. 

Let the debate continue.