Mobile Content in SB Ads

While I didn’t actually watch the Super Bowl, I did of course watch the commercials here. (You can also watch and vote for favorites at AOL.)

I counted at least three ads touting mobile content: Motorola/Verizon, Sprint and ESPN; in other words, trying to promote mobile data usage and the phone as something other than a phone.

The Motorola RAZR ad in particular was striking for its "meta communication." It showed a paperboy on a bike, delivering the newspaper and a homeowner (male) focused on his phone. When the newspaper flies into his yard the man picks it up and, without even considering it, heaves the paper back at the boy. The "tag" on the commercial was a promotion for Verizon content services (including "news and weather").

The clear message of the commercial was: "you don’t need the newspaper anymore now that you have mobile content on your phone." Ouch! — literally, as the paper hit the kid in the head.

Next year will we see an ad for Google or Yahoo! Maps and other mobile local services?

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Here’s more on the commercials from Search Engine Journal and from the WSJ (sub. req’d).