Another Super Bowl in the books, and we’re left asking ourselves questions like, “Who had a better night – Artificial Intelligence or the Backstreet Boys’ agent?” While the industry makeup of Super Bowl ads shifted, some things never change – like the use of spokes-animals and celebrity-fueled 90’s nostalgia, plus the need for advertisers to yield growth from their spot’s hefty investment.
Later in 2026 Forrester will introduce a B2C Marketing Capabilities Assessment. It’s no coincidence that several of the critical capabilities were on full display for Super Bowl advertisers – e.g. Developing a Communications Plan and Enabling Creative Excellence. The most important one is a foundational capability: Developing Growth Strategy – articulating a clear roadmap of how your marketing function drives profitable business growth. This involves identifying sources of growth among new and existing customers as well as aligning on which marketing levers to pull to convert that customer base.
Let’s look beyond the sheer star power and entertainment value of this year’s Super Bowl ads to really understand what some of these brands are trying to achieve and whether they’re set up to succeed.
Forrester’s Five Growth Levers Showed Up At Super Bowl LX
Salience: As my colleague Dipanjan Chatterjee blogged about last week, the Super Bowl is a haven for brands constrained by low relevance or seeking to embed themselves in American culture. Indeed, it should be the primary goal of Super Bowl advertising to position a brand to be thought of in purchase or usage moments. Michelob Ultra wants to be the beer you think of at apres-ski. Google Gemini’s emotional ad positions them as the AI to help imagine your future, while Genspark introduced itself as a workplace assistant with a wink to Ferris Bueller. State Farm, on the other hand, may have forfeited some salience when they abandoned their jingle and other brand assets for the sake of a fake company and some bad singing (to a great song).
Product: New products can be a means to achieve strategic business outcomes, and the Super Bowl offers a platform to introduce those to the world. Liquid Death always entertains, and did so in explosive fashion as they introduced their energy drink line extension with nutritional points of difference vs. the category. Wegovy introduced a pill form of their GLP-1 product which is a meaningful distinction from prior forms of administering the drug.
Access: Creating awareness and desire for a product is one critical marketing “job to be done”; providing a means for consumers to easily access them is another. Hims & Hers springboarded from a strategy of offering easy and affordable access to otherwise exclusive healthcare. Poppi has learned that in the world of CPG, translated advertising “vibes” to retail shelves (see image) is the way to increase Super Bowl advertising ROI. And while it may have been one of the most divisive ads in the Super Bowl, Coinbase made its case for easy accessibility to cryptocurrency. And FWIW, my family all sang along to Backstreet Boys karaoke.
Price: In a K-shaped economy where most Super Bowl watchers fall in the lower half of the K, I expected more value-driven advertising. Only Grubhub delivered, no pun intended, with an offer to “eat the fees”.
Experience: Brands that deliver on their promises through great customer experience (CX) yield higher growth, and some of them tried to demonstrate that on Sunday. Anthropic’s Claude, for example, demonstrated what a trusted conversational AI experience should and should not be. Novartis, in my personal favorite ad of the night, showed a group of “relaxed tight ends” how easy the experience of prostate cancer testing can be relative to prior alternatives.
Super Bowl ads are for the brands with the deepest of pockets and highest of risk tolerances. If that doesn’t describe you, then you’re in the majority. But clear and attainable growth strategy is mission critical for every brand. My Forrester colleagues and I can help you with your 2026 (and beyond) growth strategy. Just reach out to us, now.
