How Beyoncé won Super Bowl LVIII
Super Bowl Sunday might be the world’s biggest fight for consumer attention. M&C Saatchi’s Nicola Murray argues that this year’s winner, regardless of what happened on the field, was branding genius Beyoncé.
Was Beyonce the real winner of this year's Super Bowl? / MASON_POOLE via Beyonce.com
She may not have been the half-time performer this year, but Queen Bey used one of the world’s biggest stages to prove, once again, that her only competition is herself. Eclipsing her previous surprise music drops, Beyoncé’s leveraging of unrivaled cultural buzz around the highly-anticipated Super Bowl ads was, like her music, orchestrated to perfection.
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This year’s Super Bowl build-up had something for everyone: anticipation from Swifties about whether Tay-Tay’s flight from Japan would land in time; Usher’s generation-defying fanbase hypothesizing his set list (while admiring his Skims campaign); and sports fans debating the prowess of the San Francisco 49ers versus the Kansas City Chiefs. Against that backdrop, Beyoncé strutted in (in custom D&G thigh-high cowboy stilettos) and stole the show. Her Super Bowl ad shifted the global conversation and refocused the world’s attention on her three-part project that is consciously reclaiming black-created music genres and solidifying her legacy as an artist who truly transcends. She came to win. And she did. (Sorry Usher).
While pop and RnB swept the music narrative for Super Bowl LVIII, Beyoncé hit us up with some Country. Like her previous album, Act I: Renaissance, her upcoming project will be an education for many on the legacy of the genre (while enabling fans to reuse their sequin cowboy hats from the Renaissance World Tour).
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Preparing to win
Playing it back, we can see the meticulous planning behind the supercharged tease of Renaissance Act II. From the impeccable Pharrell-designed Louis Vuitton cowboy outfit at the Grammys (perfectly captured in images catapulted across the globe as Beyonce looked up towards her husband stealing the show in his own way, while advocating against her Album of the Year snubs) to fans sleuthing on socials (shout out to DeuxMoi) to the ad partnership and the global radio play. The new material landed with force. One minute we are floored by a TV ad in a sports game, the next the track is blasting out on Radio1. That’s how you do it.
It’s inspirational stuff, resetting the bar for music artists to aspire to her level of success through making their marketing machine just as much of an art form as their music. To take a line from her Netflix-released Coachella film, “If my country ass can do it, they can do it!”.
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A brand genius
Like her strategies, Beyoncé’s brand partnerships are long-term and this partnership has provided a relationship of trust which all parties benefit from. Verizon, a partner of the Renaissance World Tour and likely to be sponsor of (fingers crossed) a residency at the MSG Sphere in Vegas, have managed to provide a peak behind the curtain of a global icon who is famously protective of her brand.
The advert perfectly nods to her ‘break the internet’ moment of 2013’s ‘Beyonce’ album (a whole year before Kim K’s Paper magazine cover for anyone in doubt) while providing a dollop of the Beyoncé dichotomy-awareness; an icon of our times, but humble enough to keep working as if she still has something to prove. The production is slick, the script is on point, showing a side to her we don’t often get to see, but the ending of the ad is the mic drop, and as always with Beyonce, the mic is ON.
Never mind the final score, this will be the touchdown we’ll be referencing for years to come.
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