Often referred to in advertising circles as “the Super Bowl for women”, the event continues to be a marquee franchise for advertisers. TNS Media Intelligence has once again searched its extensive database to compile key figures and trends on the past ten years of Academy Awards advertising.

According to TNS Media Intelligence, marketers have spent over $650 million during the past decade to advertise during the live network TV broadcast of the awards ceremony.

The Price of Advertising
Over the past 10 years, the price of a :30 second spot in the Academy Awards has increased by 75 percent, reaching $1.67 million in 2007. Total ad spend in the show has almost doubled during this period.

The cost of a :30 unit in the ceremony has consistently been about 35 percent less than the Super Bowl.

ACADEMY AWARDS ADVERTISING
RATES AND SPENDING
1998-2007

Top Advertisers In The Academy Awards
Over the past ten years, total ad spending in the Academy Awards has been $651.0 million. A short list of blue-chip advertisers, representing a diverse range of categories, have accounted for over 60 percent of the total amount.

General Motors, American Express, JC Penney, L’Oreal, McDonalds and MasterCard have been recurring sponsors. Pepsico, which was a sponsor through 2005, and Coca-Cola, which took over the beverage category sponsorship in 2006, round out the top of the list. The aggregate spending from these marketers during the past ten Academy Award shows is $381.2 million.

TOP ADVERTISERS IN THE ACADEMY AWARDS
1998-2007

Source: TNS Media Intelligence

The Academy Awards is also significant for its annual retention of advertisers. On average, over the past ten years, 75 percent of the yearly ad spend in the telecast has come from advertisers who bought time the previous year. This is a higher retention level than the Super Bowl achieves (63 percent).

TV Ratings For The Academy Awards: Trending Downward
The current prime-time TV season has been shaped by the writer’s strike, its impact on TV program schedules, and significant audience rating declines at the broadcast networks. As the industry attempts to regain its footing following the strike settlement, the Academy Awards becomes an early litmus test for broadcast network TV and its ability to recapture lost viewers.

The audience ratings for the show will be closely scrutinized. As viewing choices continue to expand, the TV audience continues to splinter and ratings get smaller. The Academy Awards telecast has not been immune to this trend. Audience levels have declined by about 25 percent over the past decade.

In any given year, viewer interest in the awards ceremony may rise or fall based on the slate of nominated films, actors and actresses and the buzz surrounding them. The celebrity hosting the show can also be a contributing factor, either positive or negative. However, the long-term trend is unmistakably downward, as it is for TV programming in general.

Less Is More – Ad Clutter In The Academy Awards
In an era where the trend is towards greater amounts of TV advertising time, the Academy Awards stands out for the uncluttered environment it offers marketers.

In recent years, the show has been averaging 9-10 minutes of network ads per hour. This amount includes 7-8 minutes of paid messages with the remainder being promotional plugs from the network for its own programming. The comparable figure for the Super Bowl is 10.5 -12.0 minutes per hour and for a typical hour of prime time network programming it is 14-15 minutes.

Advertiser Overlap In The Academy Awards And The Super Bowl
The two largest and priciest advertising events of the year occur within several weeks of each other every year – The Super Bowl and the Academy Awards. Given the high price tag of a commercial in these two shows, you might expect that advertisers would choose only one of the two events.

In fact, in a typical year there are several advertisers who run spots in both the Academy Awards and the Super Bowl – one-fourth to one-third of Academy Awards advertisers also bought time in the Super Bowl.

However, every four years, the Winter Olympics provides advertisers with a third option to the Academy Awards and the Super Bowl. This was the case in 2006, where many perennial mutual Oscars and Super Bowl advertisers opted out of one of these events in favor of the Olympics.

SHARED ADVERTISERS:
ACADEMY AWARDS AND SUPER BOWL

About TNS Media Intelligence
Established in 23 countries with more than 16,000 customers, TNS Media Intelligence is part of TNS, the global marketing insight and information group. TNS Media Intelligence monitors 3 million brands worldwide across a multitude of media, including TV, radio, print, Internet, cinema and outdoor. The company offers a full range of insights and analyses, including the tracking of advertising expenditures and advertising creative, as well as news and social media monitoring and sports sponsorship evaluation.

In the U.S., TNS Media Intelligence is the leading provider of strategic advertising intelligence to advertising agencies, advertisers, and media properties. The company's tracking technologies collect advertising expenditure and occurrence data, as well as select creative executions, for more than 2.8 million brands across 20 media in North America. The U.S. headquarters are in New York City with sales locations in major markets throughout the United States.
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