Chuck Tomkovick

The USA's biggest marketing event keeps getting bigger: an in-depth look at Super Bowl advertising in the 1990s

Over the last decade, US Super Bol advertising has evolved into a unique phenomenon. US advertisers love the Super Bowl because it has reached an average television audience of over 120 million US viewers for the last 10 years. This manuscript examines the popularity of Super Bowl advertising during the 1990s. Every Super Bowl advertisement aired in the USA during the 10-year period 1990-1999 was video taped and viewed. In addition, USA Todays published Super Bowl advertisement likeability results were incorporated into the analysis. A total of 454 national advertisements were examined with regard to advertisement likeability. The impact of humour, advertisement length, animals, celebrities and product category type on advertisement likeability was assessed with the help of a comprehensive Super Bowl advertisement likeability model. It was hypothesized that each of these variables would be positively related to Super Bowl advertisement likeability. The results of a multiple regression analysis indicated that all these factors except the presence of celebrities had a strong significant impact on advertisement likeability scores.Based on these findings,this paper provides advertising strategy recommendations for future Super Bowl advertisers and marketing academics.

Ten Anchor Points for Teaching Principles of Marketing

Effective marketing instructors commonly share a love for their students, an affinity for the subject matter, and a devotion to continuous quality improvement. The purpose of this article is to highlight 10 anchor points for teaching Principles of Marketing, which are designed to better engage students in the learning process. These anchor points—caring, realism, preparation, classroom comfort, humor, high standards, passion/compassion, humility, time management, and honesty—are vital aids in crafting meaningful student engagement and learning. In the article, each of these anchors is linked to current research findings on high-quality marketing instruction. Additionally, suggestions for each anchor point are presented.

Evaluating Entry-Level Sales Applicants: An Application of Policy Capturing by Collegiate Recruiters

Most marketing graduates enter the workforce through sales positions. The transition from school to professional selling is a critical juncture for applicants and companies. This study identified the relative importance of 15 attributes used by collegiate recruiters’ in making hiring decisions concerning entry-level sales applicants. These same 15 attributes formed the basis of a hiring propensity model, which was determined to be significant. To determine assessment patterns, a policy capturing methodology was employed. Over 4,000 entry-level sales applicant profiles were evaluated by recruiters and students. Findings revealed recruiters used a four-tier evaluative schema in forming hiring propensity judgments and use a variety of “knock-out” factors to screen candidates. Implications are offered for marketers hiring entry-level sales personnel, applicants looking for their first professional sales position, and marketing educators.

Assessing the Value of an Undergraduate Marketing Technology Course: What Do Educators Think?

Technology can be infused into existing courses, or a unique technology course specific to this need can be developed. We surveyed decision makers at AACSB member institutions to assess the value of incorporating technology into the curriculum, and the means by which it is done. A majority agree that teaching marketing technology is of present and growing importance. However, few schools offer the dedicated course in marketing technology. Based on survey findings, this paper advocates the dedicated technology course where feasible, and provides ideas for overcoming identified teaching obstacles. Directions for future research are also explored.

Championing Technology in Marketing Education: Assessing the Value of a Discipline-Specific Technology Course

Several approaches are available for adding technology to the marketing curriculum. These range from using technology as a course supplement to infusion of technology into existing courses to creating discipline-specific marketing technology courses. This paper examines the discipline-specific marketing technology course and the experience with it at one Midwestern University. Following a review of technology-based approaches, the mechanics of the discipline-specific technology course are discussed. Also reviewed are survey feedback results from graduates that had successfully completed the course. We conclude with implementation challenges and recommendations.

Super Bowl ad likeability: Enduring and emerging predictors

US advertisers love the Super Bowl because it reaches a huge and highly receptive audience. One metric that Super Bowl advertisers watch closely is ad likeability as this is correlated with sales success. Tomkovick, Yelkur, and Christians (2001, Journal of Marketing Communications 7: 89–108) studied ad likeability for Super Bowl ads in the 1990s. In this paper, we replicate and extend their research using USA Todays measurement of Super Bowl ad likeability in the decade of the 2000s as our dependent variable of interest. Our findings on 438 Super Bowl ads show that humor, animals, and product category were enduring predictors of ad likeability. Product information and the presence of children in Super Bowl ads were found to be emerging predictors of ad likeability. Most notably, the amount of product information provided in Super Bowl commercials was inversely related to ad likeability. Implications for advertisers are presented, as are conclusions, study limitations and directions for future research.

Perspectives from Marketing Internship Providers.

Internship research published in marketing and business education journals primarily examine student perspectives about internships or reports results based on other business disciplines. To more accurately understand how employers perceive marketing interns and internships, 352 managers located in the Midwestern United States were surveyed. Respondents rated five skills and qualifications they deemed most important and rated previous interns on their abilities and expected firm benefits. Key findings include recognizing preferred methods of recruiting interns (including the emergence of social networking), identifying the tasks interns perform, and considering firm demographics on internship perspectives and practices.

Super Bowl Ads: An Empirical Investigation of the Advertising-to-Sales Relationship

Abstract The aura surrounding Super Bowl commercials is unique in American culture. These in-game ads are closely watched and critiqued by millions of television viewers in a manner that is both entrenched and ritualistic. Fueled by the relentless media hype that surrounds them, these ads attract an eclectic audience comprised of both Main Street and Wall Street viewers. In summary, Super Bowl telecasts are routinely the most highly watched programs aired on television, its viewers are as interested in the ads as they are in the game, and the athletes and advertisers share the stage in this high stakes, high profile buzz-driven entertainment environment. While the size and make-up of the audience which views the ads are fairly predictable, the results that the ads generate are much less apparent. It is commonly known that airtime cost exceeds

A Cross-Functional, Multi-Disciplinary Approach to Teaching E-Commerce

100,000 per second, and ad production and merchandising expenses represent millions of dollars beyond that. With this cost meter running at full tilt, it is apparent that something dramatic needs to occur on the revenue side for firms to re-coop their investments. The purpose of this manuscript is to investigate this advertising-to-sales relationship through the study of five product categories which were commonly represented in the array of 2009 Super Bowl ads. These include soft drinks, sports drinks, beer, cereal, and salty snacks. This type of brand-specific, Super Bowl advertising analysis has not been reported in the literature before. Below are the research questions which this study investigates. 1. Do brands which receive in-game Super Bowl advertising support experience significant sales lift, and if so, for how long? 2. How do the sales of Super Bowl promoted products compare with the sales of competitive products which do not receive similar in-game advertising support? Regarding this studys methodology, The Nielsen Company, a global leader in market research and online intelligence, Need a comma here was contacted and generously gave this researcher permission to analyze their proprietary scanning data for the weeks surrounding the 2009 Super Bowl. Access was restricted to bar-code scanned data from one large retail chain in one large metropolitan area. A non-disclosure agreement included the prohibition on referencing any specific brands analyzed. Sales data on 501 products for the weeks ending January 31, February 7, February 14, February 21, and February 28„ 2009 were analyzed. These items included ten products which received in-game advertising support for the 2009 Super Bowl February 1, 2009. Analyses included weekly dollar sales for each product as well as percentage changes in the dollar volume of those products for same store sales versus comparable weeks in 2008. Regarding results, of the nine Super Bowl promoted brands represented in this study, the two salty snacks brands and one of the two soft drink brands consistently outperformed their category for each of the first three weeks following the Super Bowl. If this same pattern were replicated across the nation, then these sales increases alone would more than pay for the investment in Super Bowl ads. The beer brands promoted in the Super Bowl also experienced robust sales, but did not outperform their category. This is in part because the entire beer category generated hefty sales during this study period. Given that beer sales for Super Bowl promoted products were uniformly strong, and got stronger in weeks following the game, the link between advertising and revenue again appears solid. With respect to cereal and sports drinks, the results were mixed. The sports drink brand which chose to invest in Super Bowl advertising did not fare as well. Ironically, this brand utilized the talents of Tiger Woods and other celebrities to promote its expanding line of sports drinks. This brand experienced sales declines in three of the four weeks following the Super Bowl. Given that this was long before the Tiger Woods PR debacle, the results provide little evidence that a positive advertising-to-sales relationship existed for this brand within this period of study. Finally, with respect to cereal, the Super Bowl promoted brand in this study did experience very strong sales growth for weeks two, three and four following the game. This sales growth averaged approximately 33 percent for these three weeks, suggesting that the high profile attention this brand received during the Super Bowl may have resonated with the buying public in the market studied. It is important to exercise caution and not over-generalize these results. First of all, it is not suggested that these Super Bowl ads are causing sales results. Rather, this paper identified the association between these advertisements and sales. There are numerous reasons why Super Bowl products may do well in the marketplace including distribution strength and brand loyalty. Implications for advertisers and researchers are discussed, as are study limitations and future research directions.

Marketing Internships: Expectations and Perceptions of Students and Internship Providers

Marketing educators today are faced with the challenge of teaching students about electronic commerce in a rapidly changing business world. This paper presents an innovative approach to teaching E-commerce that was recently piloted at a large, public midwestern university. The authors discuss the increasing need for cross-functional, multi-disciplinary undergraduate business education and then explain how this approach has been applied to their E-commerce module. The modules learning objectives, content, administration, and grading are briefly reviewed. Also highlighted are the teaching perspectives of the instructors who created this E-commerce module. The article concludes with an assessment of the model, a review of student feedback, and a summary of planned changes to be adopted the next time the E-commerce module is taught.