Super Bowl Advertising: Play-By-Play on the Big Game's Commercials

Feb. 5, 2010— -- This Super Bowl Sunday, hundreds of millions of eyes will be glued to TV sets for the big game. As the Colts and Saints prepare to square off on the field, advertisers are readying for another year of eye-popping ads.

In our commercial-skipping, DVR era, you'd think viewers would be annoyed by all those ads, but the Super Bowl might be the one broadcast that bucks the trend. According to a survey from the Nielsen Company, over half of viewers say they enjoy the ads more than the actual game.

The buzz for this year's ads has been building for weeks. Here are five categories of commercials to look for when you sit down for this Sunday's game.

ISSUE COMMERICALS

Some of this year's ads are pushing a lot more than soda… they're selling ideology. The most prominent example is a "Right to Life" commercial featuring Heisman winner Tim Tebow. Conservative Christian organization 'Focus on the Family' is paying for the spot, which CBS agreed to run despite a longstanding policy banning advocacy ads. That ad hasn't been released yet, but Planned Parenthood has already put out its own rebuttal on YouTube, featuring pro football player Sean James and Olympic gold medalist Al Joyner. "We're working toward the day where every woman will be valued," James says in the ad, "where every woman's decision about her health and her family will be respected."

BANNED COMMERCIALS

Then, there are those ads that won't be seen at all. Some have been deemed too racy for broadcast by CBS. GoDaddy.com, the domain registration site, has made an art in recent years of generating buzz through banned commercials. This year, a gay dating site is using the same tactic. ManCrunch submitted an ad featuring two male football fans kissing, but CBS's standards and practices department rejected it outright and suggested the company was just looking for free publicity.