This year’s Super Bowl has come and gone; some people are happy, some (like us) are recovering from drowning our sorrows. No matter which team you cheered for, or if you were just watching for the snacks, there were some pretty awesome ads. And while most of us couldn’t swing the $4 million price tag for a 30 second commercial, your biz can learn a few lessons from how the big guys integrated social media in their Super Bowl marketing.

We not saying which advertisements we thought were the best or worst, but a few had some great call-outs for social media. We aren’t too proud to say there was a lump in our throats after watching Budweiser‘s heart wrenching, tearjerker of a commercial that had a cute pony and great use of a Twitter hashtag. At the end of the commercial they included #Clydesdales where you can tweet potential names for the baby Clydesdale who had the staring role. What’s more, this was the first Twitter handle for Budweiser  – way to come out of the gate strong!

Oreo had not one, but two great uses of social media. First, they had a funny commercial pitting cookie against cream filling. Not only were we grabbing our keys to run out and buy some, we also checked out their Instagram account; where we could tag a picture with cookie or creme and they might re-create it using our fave part. Yum!  Your biz could also get a boost from the 90 million Instagram users by creating a page sharing photos. And they don’t have to be pics related to your business, share things you see on your commute to work, people or events around the office, or your city. Plus they took advantage of the blackout and tweeted an ad that said, “ You can still dunk in the dark.” Way to turn a “dark” moment into great advertising, and quickly too!

And finally, though our team didn’t bring home the trophy, we get rewarded by Jell-O with a pudding drop in our city. While we wait for our pudding to arrive we checked out their website, including the Baltimore Blocker. Yep, they’ll hide all references to that other team while our wounds heal, and instead we’ll see hipster puppies. Now if only someone can do this during the next election everyone can be happy campers!

What did you think of the 2013 Super Bowl ads? Anything you’ll apply to your own business?

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