TV ads during the Super Bowl are expensive: $4 million for 30 seconds of media, to be precise, and that’s before paying for things like production costs, agency fees and celebrity endorsements. They do, however, allow advertisers to reach over 100 million viewers at a single time — and be part of the cultural zeitgeist.
The digital industry regularly complains it doesn’t see the level of big-brand ad investment TV does, so we thought it’d be interesting to figure out how far $4 million would go in the world of digital advertising. Here’s what it’d buy, in theory at least:
–
A portal roadblock every day for at least a week
AOL, Yahoo and other major publishers sell day-long homepage takeovers for around $500,000, media buyers report. That means $4 million could ensure your ads are plastered all over a major homepage non-stop for at least a week.
$4 million / $500,000 = 8 days
–
Over 100 million video impressions on Hulu
According to media buyers, Hulu currently sells its video ad inventory at around a $30 CPM. Therefore:
$4 million / $30 CPM = 130 million impressions
–
200 pieces of BuzzFeed-sponsored content
Agencies say BuzzFeed typically charges around $100,000 for four or five pieces of branded content. Based on that figure, $4 million would buy a lot of branded content.
$4 million / $20,000 = 200 pieces of content.
–
An eight-day YouTube homepage ad
Instead of a Super Bowl ad you could buy out YouTube’s homepage ad units for at least 10 days, based on a price tag of up to $500,000 a day.
$4 million / $500,000 = 8 days
–
Twitter’s Promoted Trending Topic every day for a month
Promoted trending topics on the social network currently sell for up to $120,000 a day. Based on that figure, $4 million would afford you the paid placement every day for at least a month.
$4 million / $120,000 = 33 days
–
A lot of impressions on Tumblr’s “Radar”
Tumblr’s Radar ad unit costs $25,000 for 6 million impressions, not including any earned media those impressions may lead to if and when users share that content around the network. $4 million could, in theory, buy over 900 million impressions. In reality, Tumblr would, of course, have difficulty delivering them, and reach would be limited.
$4 million / $120,000 = 33 days
–
50 million Forbes.com first-page interstitials
Media buyers say Forbes charges around an $80 CPM for its welcome interstitial ads. At that price you could buy around 50 million impressions, but even if every impression hit a unique user, that’d still only be half the potential audience for a Super Bowl ad.
$4 million / $80 CPM = 50 million impressions
–
Over 100 million video network impressions
A typical video ad network buy is charged in the region of $10 CPM. On that basis, $4 million could buy around 400 million impressions.
$4 million / $10 CPM = 400 million impressions
-
Digiday+ Research deep dive: YouTube holds strong as a reliable marketing channel for agencies and brands
YouTube might not be considered the most exciting marketing channel out there, but brands and agencies see the platform as a reliable marketing channel that delivers consistent success.
-
Pringles goes all in on social to put college athletes front-and-center for ‘March Mustache’ campaign
Pringles is turning to social media — particularly Instagram — to leverage some of the college athletes playing in the March Madness basketball tournament, with the goal of reaching college basketball fans on second screens.
-
Short-form video needs better monetization, creator funds aren’t the way to do it
Creator funds have almost been like a stepping stone before a more permanent solution is either considered or put into place.
-
SponsoredHow advertisers are leveraging omnichannel attribution and measurement to power CTV
Sponsored by MNTN Connected TV advertising has joined and expanded the larger ecosystem of campaigns that advertisers deploy. As such, omnichannel marketing strategies now encompass television and mobile devices, tablets and other screens such as out-of-home. And as customers engage across these different touchpoints, brands are seeking and moving their measurement and analytics efforts to […]
-
L’Oreal uses social listening, in-house teams to tap into beauty trends ‘at the speed of culture’
The beauty behemoth is turning to in-house teams to accelerate content production that taps into trends within days, rather than the weeks or months of traditional marketing and advertising timelines.
-
With Canva and Adobe’s new updates, the generative AI race enters the brand design space
Canva and Adobe are just two of several major design and visual platforms that are rapidly introducing new generative AI capabilities in the service of brands.
