The Super Bowl business

Here are a few things to remember about the Super Bowl’s place in the American cultural landscape.

It was the most-watched Super Bowl ever, attracting 97.6 million viewers, according to Nielsen Media Research. The total U.S. population is 303.3 million, which means that 205.7 million Americans on Sunday were doing something other than watching the Super Bowl. If the Super Bowl is supposed to be the most important television event in America, it holds that importance with less than one-third of the population.

The Nielsen rating for the game was 43.3, the highest rating for a Super Bowl since 1997. That means that 56.7 television households in the U.S. were watching something else, or nothing at all.

The Super Bowl is big, but it does not define “us.” I always watch, because as a football fan, I am part of the Super Bowl crowd. There may not be more than 45 million of us in the mix. A local television morning news poll today showed that, of those responding, 50 percent watched because of the game. Ten percent watched because of the commercials. Twenty percent watched because of the halftime show (Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers). Ten percent watched because of “the food.” That leave 10 unidentified percent who watched for reasons too minor to identify, which would account for those who watched because they wanted to see Ryan Seacrest, the “American Idol” host, who had a part in the pre-game show, interviewing celebrities.

Media professionals (not the media itself) have successfully turned the Super Bowl into an event with attractions for varied demographic groups in order to maximize the sets of eyeballs that the NFL and the contracting network (in this case Fox) use to attract top-dollar advertisers. This year, the Super Bowl advertising rates were $2.7 million for 30 seconds of commercial time.

That’s a lot of money, but advertisers are happy to pay it because they know very few Americans, relatively, would spend a dime for a six-pack of Bud Light, not to mention $5.95. So they need a lot of eyeballs to get a decent return. Advertisers in general weep with joy at a return of three percent on a commercial, even from their target demographic of 18-to-34-year-old males. A lot of those watch the Super Bowl for the game, and for the halftime show, and for the food, and for Ryan Seacrest. So they get decent bang for the buck for their $2.7 million, even though they know going in, that 97 percent of the viewer population (which is less than a third of the total population) is not going to bite.

Everyone associated with the Super Bowl, even the NFL – most of all the NFL – understands the Super Bowl is not about the football business. It is about the television business. And television has a strong “we” effect. If a significant group of people watch something on television, it gives the impression that “we” are watching. All of us, and it must be near our cultural core. Not so. Top-rated sitcoms routinely get Nielsen ratings of 20 or less, meaning 80 percent of the television universe is doing something else. Oprah has achieved a global we effect that gets a rating of 4 or less. The Super Bowl was fun, but only a minor cultural diversion.