Academy Awards: “The Super Bowl for Women”
Posted on | February 17, 2009 | No Comments
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by Robert Passikoff
The Academy Awards are called “The Super Bowl for Women,” but female ratings have been on the decline. And while it’s the second-most viewed TV event after the Super Bowl, these days if you’re looking for winners, it’s better to bet on engagement than it is on eyeballs.
Viewership this year is likely to be up as consumers – disheartened by the economy – seek some glamorous escapist entertainment that doesn’t cost anything. Even though ABC lowered the price for ads from $1.7 million to $1.4 million some major advertisers, like GM and Revlon, have exited due to the economy. So those who do advertise will just have to wait to see if their investments paid off.
But while we wait for the numbers to come in, we’d like to point out that the investment of millions of dollars doesn’t have to be done in a vacuum. Engagement metrics can advise advertisers whether they’re making a good (or bad) investment. It can be done for any brand, for any media touch point before you spend your money.
So here are the results of our annual Academy Awards Engagement survey, conducted among 1,000 men and women, 18 – 59 years of age. The process quantifies the level of engagement created by the combination of the media environment and the advertised brand – the increase (or decrease) to a brand’s equity resulting from an advertising effort on a particular show like the Academy Awards. It reports the “return” or “loss” gained from the advertising effort.
The results have been indexed to allow for cross-category brand comparisons, and are benchmarked to 100–like so much in this world, higher is better (+ 5 result in a significant ROI at the 95% confidence level.) Results for 9 specific brands reported to be advertising this year were as follows:
Apple : 107
Cingular Wireless: 103
Coke: 105
ING: 99
JCPenney: 101
Mastercard: 109
Pepsi: 106
Salton: 104
UPS: 102
An increase in brand equity always results in an increased engagement. That means viewers will pay more attention to the advertising, think better of the product, and actually go out and buy the advertised product.
Anyway, last year we offered up some odds on who would win the Academy Awards based on the same loyalty and engagement assessments we use to measure ad success. They managed to predict – with 90% accuracy – the recipients of the various Oscars. So here are the odds we came up with for the “big” categories this year. We provide these for entertainment value only. If you’re making real bets on the outcomes, you’re on your own! (Advertisers without engagement metrics are always on their own!)
BEST PICTURE
Slumdog Millionaire: 3:1
Benjamin Button: 4:1
Milk: 5:1
The Reader: 8:1
Frost/Nixon: 12:1
BEST ACTOR
Sean Penn: 3:1
Mickey Rourke: 4:1
Frank Langella: 5:1
Richard Jenkins: 10:1
Brad Pitt: 20:1
BEST ACTRESS
Kate Winslet: 3:1
Meryl Streep: 4:1
Anne Hathaway: 5:1
Melissa Leo: 6:1
Angelina Jolie: 10:1
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Heath Ledger: 2:1
Josh Brolin: 4:1
Philip Seymour Hoffman: 4:1
Michael Shannon: 20:1
Robert Downey Jr.: 25:1
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Penelope Cruz: 3:1
Viola Davis: 3:1
Marisa Tomei: 5:1
Taraji P. Henson: 10:1
Amy Adams: 15:1
BEST DIRECTOR
Danny Boyle: 2:1
David Fincher: 4:1
Stephen Daldry: 5:1
Gus Van Sant: 7:1
Ron Howard: 20:1
We wish all the nominees and advertisers “good luck.” Actor/Director Clint Eastwood once noted, “There’s a lot of great movies that have won the Academy Award, and a lot of great movies that haven’t. You just do the best you can.” With engagement assessments, advertisers can do better than that.
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Robert Passikoff is founder of Brand Keys Inc. (New York), a brand and customer loyalty consultancy. He can be reached at 212-532-6028, x12, or robertp@brandkeys.com.
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