One third of Super Bowl commercials will support Shazam

Football

Do you hear what I hear? Yes, the sounds of cash registers. Shazam, the popular mobile app that tells you what song is playing, is teaming up with up to one-third of advertisers for this year’s Super Bowl. If you’re watching an ad that you’re interested in, let Shazam take a listen, and it will provide you with more information on the product.

We’re seeing a substantial attempt from advertisers to exploit the growing mobile market. Infamously, the QR code is plastered all over the place in a vain attempt to get people to hold their devices up to an ad so they can find out more about your sugar water and candy cigarettes. This is just the next attempt at duping new smartphone owners into thinking that they are doing something other than looking at more advertisements. At least Shazam doesn’t force us to look at black and white spew. I guess that’s an improvement.

If this report is to believed, 20,000 people used Shazam on the one compatible ad last Super Bowl:

Shazam’s first Super Bowl ad on Shazam for TV, where its app identifies a commercial by sound and directs users to more content, information, coupons or giveaways, was an experimental giveaway for Dockers. Roughly 20,000 users Shazam-ed the ad, Krauss said. In the last year, the company has run campaigns from the likes of Old Navy, Bud Light and Unilever for more than two million interactions with consumers.

We’re skeptical that this is going to be anything other than a short-lived novelty, but we want to know what you think. Is this actually going to work beyond the honeymoon phase? This is a conversation we’ll be watching very carefully.

Source: AdWeek
Image Credit: ElvertBarnes

Grant is a writer from Delaware. In his spare time, Grant maintains a personal blog, hosts The Weekly Roar, hosts Quadcast, and writes for video games.