Automotive Super Bowl Ad Conversion Rates For The 8 Weeks Following The Game [CHART]

Initial findings appeared to support the notion that Super Bowl advertising had a positive impact on conversion rates. Auto advertisers who advertised during the game averaged 14.9% higher conversion rates in the four weeks following the Super Bowl (February) compared to the four weeks prior (January). This effect was even stronger if they weren’t advertising a luxury vehicle.

However, plotting the conversion rates for these campaigns by week told a different story:

If Super Bowl advertising were actually driving greater conversion rates due to a sort of halo effect, then we might expect to see a significant increase immediately following the game, rather than a gradual upward trend that appears to have started in January. This led us to investigate the standard sales cycle for cars over that same period. Using data from Edmunds.com for sales in early 2014, we found that this increase in conversion rates simply mirrors the monthly industry-wide sales data. This suggests that auto advertisers get little to no additional value from their February advertising as a result of Super Bowl advertising. Read the rest at MediaPost.com.