11/11/08

Despite a slumping automotive sector, business is good at Cars.com. It must be. The company is buying a 60-second spot in the second quarter of Super Bowl XLIII, the most expensive commercial airtime on broadcast TV.

It's the second consecutive Super Bowl appearance for Cars.com. Last year, Cars.com used last year's game to kick off an estimated $200 million "Confidence Comes Standard" marketing campaign on the theme that buyers do their homework on Cars.com before walking onto dealers' lots. As the ads go, buyers' preparations keep them from resorting to "Plan B" -- outrageous scenarios to get what they want from the dealers. The ads are cute and clever and have held up well repeated throughout the year. Cars.com teases that its 2009 campaign will build upon the Plan B theme with "a twist."

What's the price tag? NBC, this year's host for the Feb. 1 game, is charging a record $3 million for premium (during half-time) 30-second spots, a little less for off-premium (during the game). If the math holds up, Cars.com is paying $6 million - or close to it. NBC said in late September it had sold 57 of its 67 half-minute ad spots and that the remaining 10 were fetching the premium price - or more - despite the slumping ad market.

Cars.com said its 2009 marketing plan is a U.S.-wide, integrated campaign that will run through the year and will be backed by its affiliate network of newspapers and TV stations and their Web sites.

"We made significant strides in moving our brand forward through our Super Bowl ads and our overall marketing campaign in 2008," said Mitch Golub, president of Cars.com. "We want to keep that momentum moving forward in 2009, and advertising on the Super Bowl gives Cars.com a way to kick off that campaign in a big way."

AdWeek projected that Cars.com would spend about $200 million in marketing again in 2009.

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CareerBuilder.com will also be returning to the upcoming Super Bowl, spokesperson Michael Erwin confirmed this morning, but he said he couldn't provide details.

Currently, CareerBuilder runs a funny "Start Building" TV campaign -- 30-second spots featuring people unhappy in their current jobs. The ads debuted in this year's Super Bowl. You can see them here. No word yet on whether there's new creative for the 2009 game.

In 2005, CareerBuilder ran three of the most successful 30-second spots in the Super Bowl on a campaign that featured bedraggled workers brow-beaten by their chimpanzee bosses. The campaign was created and managed by the Hacker Group in Seattle. In 2007, Hacker canned the monkeys and ran a less-successful campaign featuring office workers who couldn't survive jungle-like conditions. After a poor showing in the '07 Super Bowl, and complaints from CareerBuilder, Hacker took the unusual step of firing its client and, bizarrely, going on a public rant about it.

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What about three other past Super Bowl advertisers -- Monster, HotJobs and AutoTrader.com? HotJobs isn't likely -- it hasn't since it was bought by Yahoo. No word from Monster yet. Monster skipped 2008's game. CEO Sal Iannuzzi hinted recently that it would be spending a lot of money touting Monster's new rollout, although he said the marketing campaign was still in development. AutoTrader hasn't advertised in the Super Bowl since 2001.