Although it has now appeared in three motor shows since it was first revealed in January, there’s still plenty to get excited about, not least the NSX show car’s racy new colour.

Acura sports car stars in Marvel’s ‘The Avengers’

Some confusion seems to have arisen over the identity of the Acura sportscar driven by actor Robert Downey Jr. earlier this month at the premiere of Marvel’s new super-hero film, The Avengers.

A number of people speculated that the car, driven by Iron Man Tony Stark was actually the new NSX, but according to Mike Accavitti, VP of Marketing for Honda America, “that’s not exactly true, but pretty darn close”. The one-off Acura spyder was built especially for the new blockbuster film, but sadly won’t be on going on sale thereafter.

First revealed as the Acura NSX Concept at the Detroit motor show in January, the car maker chose to badge it as a Honda for last month’s Geneva show and now, here in Beijing, it’s back to wearing the Acura badge – the luxury brand of Honda initially launched for the US market.

Apart from the change in its exterior hue (from the silver-grey finish displayed in Detroit and Geneva), the NSX Concept remains powered by the same mid-engined VTEC V6 engine with direct-injection, matched to the Japanese car maker’s Sport Hybrid SH-AWD (Super Handling All Wheel Drive) system, supported by a pair of electric motors with a bilateral torque adjustable control system driving the front wheels.

A dual-clutch automatic transmission completes the package, offering supercar acceleration with outstanding efficiency.

While most supercars have previously followed the path of least resistance to deliver their performance (i.e. lots of power), the NSX Concept champions the true racing philosophy of performance through less weight.

Like the first NSX, Honda will use its flagship supercar to showcase its engineering efficiency, by combining lightweight materials with a super-efficient hybrid powerplant.

In doing so, Honda are aiming to recapture the driving spirit of the original NSX, within a more environmentally responsible package.

The original Honda/Acura NSX was built at Honda plants in Japan from 1990 to 2005, so this will be the first time Honda has manufactured a sportscar outside of its native Japan.

The car is being developed at the Ohio Centre of Honda R&D Americas (HRA) and will be built at a (yet to be named) facility in Ohio. Sales are expected to begin in 2015.

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More than a car alarm, TERII uses biometric recognition and negotiating tactics to protect against vehicle theft. Scheduled for inclusion on all* 2013 Honda vehicles.

“Car alarms have become less and less effective as a deterrent,” said Sidney Finch, TERII Project Lead at Honda. “The technological advancements of late have been focused on the quick recovery of a stolen vehicle. Our goal was to prevent the theft in the first place. And we have that in TERII,” she said.

TERII allows keyless entry to your Honda vehicle, much like conventional smart keys. But that’s where the comparison ends. Rather than keys, fingerprint scanners on the door handle identify the driver, or conversely, an intruder. TERII can transmit the thief’s prints and receive personal information through the IAFIS fingerprint database.

Once a theft attempt is determined, TERII initiates the first of five levels of negotiation to prevent unwanted ingress. TERII first attempts to reason with the thief, then escalates in tone and tactics as appropriate. TERII is empathically programmed, and is able to assess the threat level and adjust accordingly.

“This technology has proven to be incredibly effective,” said Finch.

Working with a team of former FBI hostage negotiators and cognitive psychologists, Honda engineers took 10 years to optimize TERII technology. Currently, TERII includes over 500 pre-programmed strategies.

Sensors are placed throughout the vehicle for TERII to locate the assailant and TERII’s “voice” is played through exterior speakers located just above the wheel wells. This allows TERII to communicate with a potential thief, and attempt to reason with him or her.

The artificial intelligence TERII technology is currently being tested on several Honda models, with the hopes that this feature will be added in a rolling release to all 2013 vehicles.

“Each year, Honda leads the list of most stolen vehicles, according to the National Insurance Crime Bureau,” said Finch. “Why? Because thieves are attracted to our brand for the same reasons consumers are—quality, dependability, reliability. But thieves will no longer stand a chance because TERII is here to stop them. Now, they will have to buy a Honda like everyone else.”

*Requires Technology Package and Honda Satellite-Linked Navigation System™. Available on EX-L models in the United States, except Alaska.

Although he has been the lead commentator for Eurosport’s coverage of MotoGP for the past 15 years, Moody is first and foremost a ‘car nut’ and has followed the BTCC for more than two decades. He is also a keen competitor in hill climbing and until recently held a class record on the daunting, world-famous Shelsley Walsh course.

The 39-year-old from Worcester said: “I’ve got big boots to fill – Ben was a class act – but when the opportunity came up I had to go for it. The chance to commentate on a major sport with the BTCC’s following and for ITV Sport was too good to miss and I’m over the moon to have been offered the job.

“I loved watching the Ford RS500s in the late Eighties and one of my first work experiences was actually with Prodrive when they ran the factory BMW M3s in the BTCC in 1990. I also had an involvement with the Nissan team in 1993. My father, though, was the commentator at Shelsley and I fancied a go – the next thing I’d been handed the microphone and had never been so nervous in my life!

“Then along came the bike work for Eurosport in 1996 – I’ve loved every minute of it and I’ll still fit in every MotoGP round that doesn’t clash with the BTCC this year. It’s going to be a hectic but very enjoyable schedule…

“The BTCC really fascinates me. The action for the public is out of this world, plus the drivers are not wrapped up in cotton wool – they are free to speak their mind and that leads to some really interesting characters, incidents and storylines. It makes the BTCC an addictive soap opera for viewers and it’s going to be a real honour conveying what is happening to the huge numbers of people tuning in.”

Tony Pastor, Head of Production for ITV Sport, commented: “We were really sorry to see Ben Edwards leave our team but in Toby we feel we have a terrific replacement. The BTCC is a fabulous competition and we’re delighted to be its broadcast partner. We believe that Toby has the passion and knowledge to take the viewers inside the sport and at the same time give them a real sense of just how exciting these races are. We’re delighted to welcome him on board and I expect him to become a great asset to our sports commentating team.”

And added Harvey: “I’m also delighted to be working with Toby. He’s a motor racing fan through and through and will bring enthusiasm, professionalism and humour to the commentary box.”

So when Cadillac claimed it was fairest of them all, we had to take a closer look.

Cadillac’s 30-second preview of the upcoming 2013 ATS compact sport saloon during last Sunday’s Super Bowl XLVI broadcast, was apparently the most-viewed single advertising spot in U.S. television history. (With Super Bowl XVLI reaching a record U.S. television audience of 111.3 million viewers)

The data used by Cadillac was provided by Kantar Media, a well respected audience insight company, using return path data (RPD) sampled passively through the set-top boxes of an opted-in audience. The sample size used was 100,000 (of the 111.3 million audience) and Kantar Media then sample a behaviour they call ‘TuneAway’, which is essentially when a household changes channel to avoid a commercial.

The lower the TuneAway, the more successful the ad or programme. In theory.

A large proportion of investments made in technology companies at the moment are in the field of audience research and response, mostly to optimise online spend or manage customer relationships on 3rd party platforms such as Facebook. Each try to promise a ‘silver bullet’ solution (one dashboard for all needs) and tend to focus on the interpreted data rather than the method (and its assumptions) used in producing the data.

The problem though with all TV audience data is that it measures the behaviour of a household, rather than a person. A household could be a group of mates sitting down to watch the game, a family dictated to by a dominant parent or even a busy social gathering where the TV is switched on in the background.

Additionally, just like many online traffic measurements (such as Alexa or Comscore) the audience panels providing the data must first be opted in, which is often achieved via incentives (free anti-virus software, of gift vouchers). This further skews the data towards those people who look out for free-gift offers.

Cadillac’s spot, called “Green Hell,” aired at 9:37 Eastern Time, during the game’s “two-minute warning” official timeout, so audiences were literally on the edge of their seats. How many of them stayed there, rather than visiting the loo or fetching another beer is anyone’s guess.

Whilst Cadillac may have scored highest (43.46 for their 30 second spot) in the 100,000 household sample, they are currently only 47th in the Viral Video Chart with a little over 536,000 views and 1,989 shares.

This compares with Volkswagen’s 23 million views and 942,943 shares and Honda with 19.3 million and 360,900 shares, so you can see why I almost choked on my breakfast this morning. All of these are of course online viewing figures, but they likewise portray the behavior of individual people, each of whom have ‘chosen’ to click on a video rather than passively viewing it during a live broadcast.

The lesson? Don’t believe everything you read and make sure you understand how behavioural data has been compiled and the context that it refers to.

It’s good to see Cadillac embracing the Nurburgring so strongly during development of their ATS sports saloon, I just hope they’ve also inherited some of their Germanic competitor’s understatement when it comes to the performance of the car.

Whilst there are several instances in the 100+ Super Bowl ads, we’re interested in Automotive brands and fortunately there are several juicy ones to take a look at.

The NFL takes issue with Chrysler’s “It’s Halftime in America” commercial

Chrysler’s ad was by far the most ‘moving’ ad of the Super Bowl, featuring Hollywood legend Clint Eastwood narrating the story of Detroit’s Motor City, digging deep despite the tough conditions and coming out fighting for the second half.

How does this grab you? “This country can’t be knocked out with one punch. We get right back up again and when we do the world’s going to hear the roar of our engines. Yeah, it’s half time America and our second half is about to begin.” Powerful stuff.

So, amidst such inspiring poetry it came as something of a surprise when a kerfuffle kicked off as the NFL (Super Bowl rights holders) claimed the ad violated their copyrights. The ad was taken down from YouTube, but then an NFL spokesperson subsequently claimed the league didn’t take the ad down and is now asking Google to investigate.

Something is certainly going on – Chrysler have been frantically contacting publishers and asking us to display their ad, but when we uploaded a copy to YouTube this afternoon it was immediately removed, accompanied by the message “This video has been removed because its content violated YouTube’s Terms of Service. Sorry about that.”

What’s the matter, don’t they like poetry..?

So what was it? A marketing stunt? A misunderstanding, or a media storm contrived from our over-active imagination? Take a look and see for yourself.

Ford lawyers-up over Chevy’s Silverado commercial

Chevy’s Silverado ad takes a direct swipe at rival Ford, as it tells the story of group of men who survive a world-destroying apocalypse (as supposedly predicted by an ancient Mayan calendar), because they all owned Chevrolet Silverado trucks. However, one of their friends (Dave) doesn’t make it.

“Dave didn’t own the longest lasting, most dependable truck on the road,” one of the surviving group says. “Dave bought a Ford.”

Ford, were naturally outraged by such a negative portrayal of their brand and delivered a ‘cease and desist’ order to General Motors, due to the “unsubstantiated and disparaging claims regarding Ford’s pickup trucks.”

Chevrolet, who clearly had no intention of complying with Ford’s request, didn’t just run the ad as planned but have continued to fuel the spat by joining a live web discussion on the automotive blog Jalopnik.

Ford is objecting to the reference that the Chevrolet Silverado is “the longest lasting, most dependable truck on the road”, and said that “..If Chevrolet does not comply with our request (they didn’t) to permanently remove the commercial from its website, its YouTube and Facebook pages and any other internet sites, then Ford will take all appropriate steps to enforce and protect its reputation.”

General Motors (parent company of Chevrolet) remain unrepentant, saying “We stand by our claims in the commercial, that the Silverado is the most dependable, longest lasting full-size pickup on the road.”

Ewanick went on to say, “We can wait until the world ends, and if we need to, we will apologize. In the meantime, people who are really worried about the Mayan calendar coming true should buy a Silverado right away.”

Now that’s just rubbing salt in an already very raw wound…

Toyota serve up some Super Bowl spam on Twitter

As reported in the marketing blog eConsultancy this morning, via a report originally published on The Next Web, Toyota were caught red-handed trying to boost their Camry Effect campaign by sending unsolicited messages to random individuals, apparently based on nothing more than a tweet in their timeline mentioning the Super Bowl.

Here’s what TNW had to say in their article, “In what is probably the worst Twitter promotion I’ve seen on the platform since the company launched in 2006, Toyota has created a slew of accounts and is spamming people about what it is calling the “Camry Effect a Friend’ Giveaway!”. The worst part is that they’re all verified accounts, so while Twitter isn’t involved in the promotion, someone at the company definitely knows about it.”

Toyota subsequently apologised in the following statement, “We apologize to anyone in the Twitterverse who received an unwanted @reply over the past few days. We were excited to share the message of our Camry Effect campaign in a new way and it was never our intention to displease anyone.
We’ve certainly learned from this experience and have suspended the accounts effective immediately to avoid any additional issues.
Kimberley Gardiner, National Digital Marketing & Social Media Manager, Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A. Inc.”

Embarrassing mistake? Or deliberate tactic to gain exposure? You decide, but as is proven by this article, all 3 brands have certainly drawn attention away from their competitors and become a talking point in sections of the media that wouldn’t normally be talking about their cars.

We took a sample of the data yesterday, to provide for a pre and post-game view of the main contenders, and learned that Honda’s Ferris Bueler themed videos were firmly in the lead for views, if not social shares. 

But less than 18 hours later, the leaderboard has changed to underline just how competitive the battle has become.

First things first, if you were following the Twitter feed last night of @unrulymedia or @VideoChart, then you’ll have noticed the following stats;

1. <40 million people were estimated to have shared their favourite ads online 'after' the game (35 million of these via Facebook)
2. It was estimated that 2.5 million people would send their favourite Super Bowl ads to their friends using YouTube 
3. The highest tweets per second came at the end of the game – 12,233, followed by the second highest during Madonna’s performance, reaching 10,245 tweets per second.
4. Whilst in the final 3 minutes of the Super Bowl game, an average of 10,000 tweets per second were sent. 

If you’re head’s not spinning from those numbers, then let’s take a look at the Automotive brands and what changed on our scoreboard overnight.

Yesterday’s Pre-game data (as of 05/2/2012 at 17:00 GMT)

The post-game reckoning

Since yesterday evening our Top 10 Super Bowl Ads gained 15.2 million views between them – climbing from a total of 54 million to 69 million views.  The biggest gains were made by Volkswagen, with “Bark Side” climbing from 11.9 million views to 23.9 million and social shares rising modestly from 692,825 to 705,760. 

The second of Volkswagen’s Super Bowl ads, and the main feature spot during the game, “The Dog Strikes Back”, rose from 3.8 million up to 4.65 million views and from 118,712 to 145,982 social shares, proving that audiences are more interested in a dog symphony than the re-creation of a Star Wars pub in Tatooine.  Nevertheless, when combined Volkswagen’s Super Bowl ads are now back ahead of the competition with 28.55 million views and 851,742 shares.

After a surge leading up to Super Bowl 46, Honda’s Ferris Bueler inspired ads, “Coming Soon” and “Matthew’s Day Off”, have suddenly stalled, rising only 850,000 views overnight from 16.6 million to 17.45 million views. 

Honda’s luxury brand Acura performed slightly better, rising 1.4 million views from 14.1 million to 15.5 million and from 50,568 to 55,599 shares.

The Automotive sector remained dominant, although we lost 1 brand from the Top 10 (Kia Optima: “A Dream Car. For Real Life.”) and a few new entrants joined the race to become king of the Super Bowl car ads.

You’d be brave man (or woman) to bet against Volkswagen, but then let’s wait and see once the bulk of social sharing occurs during the next few weeks.  The acid test for a viral video is when its meme is adopted and re-personalised by ordinary people, when it moves outside the reach of paid promotion and connects with a wider audience reached through social and earned media.

Judging by the comments coming through on our YouTube channel, many people are only ‘just’ discovering these ads, so there’s plenty more to learn as these campaigns start to become talking points (or not) in environments outside the influence of their promoting brand.

Showcasing the design and technology direction for Honda’s next generation supercar, the NSX Concept features a V6 mid-mounted engine and will employ a range of new technologies including the innovative Sport Hybrid SH-AWD (Super Handling All Wheel DriveTM) hybrid system. It is expected to go on sale within the next three years.

While many supercars opt for a big powerful engine, the NSX Concept pursues the true racing philosophy of ‘performance through lightness’ to achieve a more favourable power-to-weight ratio.

Utilising a unique 2-Electric Motor Drive Unit with a bilateral torque adjustable control system, the new hybrid all-wheel-drive system can instantly generate negative or positive torque to the front wheels during cornering, which Honda anticipates will deliver handling performance unmatched by previous AWD systems.

In addition to the handling benefits of the Sport Hybrid SH-AWD® system, a powerful next-generation VTEC V-6 engine with direct-injection, works in concert with a dual clutch transmission with built-in electric motor, to create supercar acceleration combined with outstanding efficiency.

Speaking at last’s months Detroit show, Takanobu Ito, President and CEO of Honda Motor Co., who led the development of Honda’s first NSX supercar, said “This Sport Hybrid SH-AWD system will make the NSX the ultimate expression of the synergy between man and machine. The NSX will make the driver one with the car to enhance dynamic driving abilities without getting in the way.”

He went on to say, “Like the first NSX, we will again express high performance through engineering efficiency. In this new era, even as we focus on the fun to drive spirit of the NSX, I think a supercar must respond positively to environmental responsibilities.”

We look forward to seeing it up close and personal at Geneva.

European CR-V Prototype

Honda will also present the European CR-V Prototype at Geneva, a preview model highlighting the exterior styling direction of the all-new fourth generation European Honda CR-V, which is set to go on sale in Autumn 2012.

Compared to the previous generation, the model takes on a more aggressive stance with deeper sculpting of the body lines and a bolder front fascia. The lower front bumper wraps smartly upward to convey SUV capability, while the lower front bumper design now integrates more smoothly into the fascia for improved aerodynamics.

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It’s worth reminding you why we’re paying attention to a ‘football game’ when our main focus is obviously cars, driving and the lifestyle surrounding them.

Put simply, the Super Bowl has become the biggest stage for brand marketing in the U.S. and one of the most significant factors behind the success of each brand’s marketing activities throughout the year, both in the U.S. and globally. And surprisingly it’s Automotive brands which dominate ‘and’ rate highest with audiences in terms of increased buzz.

But Super Bowl success goes far beyond TV advertising, with nearly as many viewers watching the ads offline, and unlike ‘broadcast’ media, online represents a personal ‘choice’ and is therefore of greater value.

This is perhaps one of the best illustrations of ‘New Media’, which rather than being defined by technology (i.e. digital vs print or broadcast) is actually better explained by the separation of content from the channel it’s being carried on. Yes, there are specific adjustments necessary to optimise each medium, but the winning brands are those that treat the world as their stage and build their content to reach audiences wherever they may choose to consume it.

Topping the automotive brands in this year’s Super Bowl are Honda and Volkswagen, who’ve stolen a march on the 14 other brands who’ve ploughed tens of millions of dollars into the event. Both have leaned heavily on popular characters from TV and Film (Jay Leno, Jerry Seinfeld, Matthew Broderick, Darth Vader/Star Wars) and used humour as one of their principal ingredients.

There are also a few late entrants (BMW, Kia) that could create a few upsets for our league table, so we’ll revisit the scorecard later in the week to see how they’ve fared.

The Pre-game Scorecard

In the top 10 Super Bowl ads this year, 7 of them are for Automotive brands but even more impressive is this – 7 Automotive ads represent 92.3% of the social shares within this premiere group.

These top 10 videos have clocked up just over 54 million views between them so far, and to further underline the dominance of the automotive sector, they represent 94.4 % of this total – that’s despite the best efforts of David Beckham (H&M), Budweiser and the U.S. Navy Seal themed ‘Act of Valor’ trailer.

As before all data has been provided by Unruly Media’s Viral Video Chart and is valid as of 05/2/2012 at 17:00 GMT. Previous data was taken at 19:10 GMT on 31/1/2012.

So what’s happened?

Volkswagen’s early lead was overtaken by Honda during the latter part of the week (now 15.7 million views versus 16.6 million), although VW are miles ahead when we look at social shares (811,000 versus 329,000). Even if we included Acura (Honda’s luxury car division), we would still be looking at only 379,000 shares, but a whopping 30 million views.

GM, the biggest spender at this year’s Super Bowl, have dropped further behind the big two with Chevrolet’s ‘Happy Grad’ advert dropping from 9th to 24th in the chart, but thankfully (for Chevy) their Silverado truck advert has stepped in to carry the brand forwards (currently 12th).

Despite all the hoopla over Audi’s Twilight-themed Vampire Party ads, it must be embarrassed by its performance compared to sister brand Volkswagen. Quite frankly it hasn’t caught on – perhaps audiences are (finally!) tiring of the Robert Pattinson/Kristen Stewart storyline and Audi have been too late to the party in using it. Whatever the reason, despite a 70-100% increase on last week’s figures, the opposition seem to have a lot more power under their hoods.

Watch out for Kia going forwards next week, it’s an epic ad, with a start-studded cast and it’s clearly designed to appeal to both sexes.

But the race continues between Volkswagen and Honda/Acura. Who will win the bragging rights in our scorecard? But perhaps more importantly, who will translate their Super Bowl success into the kind of numbers their shareholders place a value on?

The Newcomers

Several new videos have joined the fray since last week, most of which we will talk about another time. If you missed the original batch of ads, then you can watch them in our previous post, meanwhile here are some of our favourite new ones.

Kia Optima: “A Dream Car. For Real Life.”

Chevy Silverado “Apocalypse” featuring Ford

BMW 3 SERIES – “THE CLOSE CALL”

Also take a look at “THE SCORE”, “THE PERFECT SEAT”, “THE BIG GRAB” and “THE ENTERTAINER”.

Chevy Sonic “Joy”

Chevy Volt “Aliens #1 – Come On”

“We have made a decision” said Honda CEO, Takanobu Ito “to enter into the WTCC with the European Civic. We will develop a totally new engine for this project and we are all excited about starting this new challenge.”

For this project, Honda has formed a joint partnership with Mugen and J.A.S. Motorsport. Honda R&D is developing a bespoke racing engine, while Mugen will manufacture and maintain it. J.A.S. Motorsport will develop the race car, using the new Honda Civic 5 door produced in Honda’s manufacturing plant located in Swindon (UK).

The racing engine will be a 1.6 litre 4 cylinder direct injection turbo-charged petrol engine, developed in accordance with FIA’s Super 2000 regulations and different to the BTCC’s NGTC (Next Generation Touring Car) specification which Honda’s BTCC team have adopted for 2012.

Honda’s ambition is to join the WTCC as early as this season, with a string of “inaugural rounds”. Discussions are currently being held with the FIA, but these rounds would include Japan (held on 21 October 2012 at Honda’s Suzuka circuit), followed by China and Macau. Honda will then enter a two car team, managed by J.A.S. Motorsport, into every race in the 2013 championship season.

This activity is being run independently to the Honda Racing British Touring Car Championship winning team. Three-times BTCC Champion, Matt Neal and Gordon ‘Flash’ Shedden will be behind the wheel of the race-prepared Team Dynamics version of the new Civic and lining up on the grid at Brands Hatch on 1 April for the first race of the 2012 season.

Racing has always been a fundamental element of Honda’s DNA. In the late 1950s Honda first entered the Isle of man T.T and then Formula 1 in the 1960s. The FIA WTCC is the next chapter in Honda’s on-going commitment to world motor sport and provides a perfect platform to demonstrate its racing spirit to Honda’s numerous fans around the world.

If you’ve clicked on this post looking to enjoy the latest videos, then I suggest you visit ‘Super Bowl XLVI – The Greatest Automotive Ad Game on Earth’, where you can view each of the automotive ads vying for the top-spot at the Big Game this year.

Meanwhile, let’s take a quick look at how the automotive sector ads are doing, now that the dust has settled.

Can Volkswagen be beaten?

Last year Volkswagen destroyed the opposition at Super Bowl XLV and most importantly during the remainder of the advertising year. Their campaign, “The Force”, clocked up nearly 53 million views in less than 12 months and a record 4.8 million social shares.

They did this, not by producing the best advert (although it was fun to watch), but because they figured out how to game the attention of online audiences, drumming up initial buzz before the campaign started (something big is coming) and then feeding people’s innate appetite to share and be acknowledged (as a trusted finder) in their social groups.

The ad went viral in its first week and sustained the interest of audiences, primarily because the meme entered the vocabulary of parody writers, was picked up and used by other media campaigns (launch of the Hollywood-produced ‘Thor’ Film) and became the poster-child for combustion-engine haters Greenpeace in their anti-VW campaign, ‘The Dark Side’.

So did Volkswagen take on board the valuable lessons from 2011? And what about the other automotive brands?

Here’s a quick look at the points table to remind us where each of the campaigns have currently reached (all data was obtained from Unruly Media’s Viral Video Chart and valid as of 31/1/2012):

In 2012, Honda learns that if you can’t beat them… why not join them?

So far in 2012, Honda are the only automotive brand within spitting distance of Volkswagen, but even so, just look at their measly 2.95% shares per view figure compared to Volkswagen’s 6.10%. To put these into perspective, in our 2011 round-up we reported Ken Block/DC Shoes Gymkhana 4 achieved 16.3%, whilst Volkswagen’s ‘The Force’ reached 10.2%.

So as a benchmark we are looking for at least 1 in every 10 views (many of which will be repeat viewings) to result in the video being shared.

Whilst the share performance of Honda’s 2 videos looks modest compared to Volkswagen, the number of views is far closer. This tells us that the pre-launch mentions of Matthew Broderick’s involvement in the campaign, plus all the media speculation about a remake of the film, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, will have generated a considerable boost in search traffic, but so far viewers haven’t been quite delighted enough to share it as readily as they have VW’s Bark Side teaser.

Perhaps the biggest disappointment so far though, is for GM/Chevrolet.

When we tally up our estimates for the media spend by automotive brands in this year’s Super Bowl, we’re looking at $66.5 million for the TV spots alone (19 spots at a minimum of $3.5 million each), add on top of this the filming & production, fees for actors, brand licensing (Twilight, Star Wars, Rocky..), agency fees and online advertising costs and there can’t be much change left from $100 million, with perhaps $30 million of that total being carried by GM.

So they’ll not be best pleased to see their main feature spot trailing the field in 7th place, although they still have 4 more ads to try and recover the lost ground.

But perhaps the most intimidating observation to make is that Volkswagen have yet to launch their full commercial (which will feature the New Beetle), but it’s early days and the Big Game is still just under 5 days away..

Conclusion

There’s no doubt in my mind, that the success of advertising in today’s digital world depends on managing the shift from paid promotion through to the more sustainable journey in earned media. Whereas earned media used to cover just professional publishers and news providers, it now includes every single consumer who writes comments, blogs or just updates their Facebook page and is therefore publishing their opinions about a brand.

This is the heartland for innovative ad campaigns who seek to maximise the reach, sustainability and re-usability of their creative message and the most difficult change to embrace for ad agencies more used to influencing rather than engaging the audience.

We’ll draw out more insights from the 2012 Super Bowl Ad war once the game is over, but for now one can only imagine Volkswagen are rather pleased with the creative work of their agency Deutsch, LA.