Akamai to Measure Advertiser's Web Traffic During Pro Football's Biggest Event

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Monday, January 29, 2007; 05:27 AM

Akamai Technologies, Inc., a leading global service provider for accelerating content and business processes online, posted its annual Akamai Net Usage Index for Advertising (www.akamai.com/netusageindex) today. Akamai is again delivering content and optimizing the corresponding online marketing campaigns for the majority of this year’s nationally televised advertisers during pro football’s most popular event on February 4, 2007.

The Akamai Net Usage Index for Advertising provides a unique view into the aggregate Web usage patterns before, during and after the game for Akamai’s customers that are integrating their broadcast advertising campaigns with an online component. Akamai's Index is the only tool that offers a real-time look at the immediate effectiveness of advertising campaigns and their corresponding Web call to actions.

Considered one of the largest advertising and marketing events of the year, companies leverage the National Football League’s Super Bowl to unveil innovative brand campaigns that often leverage the Internet to maximize the campaign’s effectiveness and further engage consumers. The Akamai Net Usage Index for Advertising shows total visitors per minute to a collection of advertisers’ sites delivered by Akamai, including Anheuser-Busch, GoDaddy.com and Garmin.

Super Bowl Is Often A Showcase for Online Advertising Trends

Akamai is well-positioned to observe some of today’s major trends in online advertising. Leading up to Super Bowl XLI, some of the trends Akamai has observed are:

• Dependence on social networking and user-generated content to create advertisements
• Many advertisers now offer the ability to capture, download and store their advertisements for future viewing. By increasing the “shelf-life” of advertisements, companies must be prepared to handle sustained web traffic not only on the day of the Super Bowl, but for as long as the content is made available on various websites, through social networking portals, via mobile devices, and more
• Despite the fact that integrated offline and online campaigns have proven most successful, many advertisers are not taking advantage of the effectiveness of closed-loop campaigns where traffic is clearly driven to a company-sponsored microsite. Last year, ads that drove viewers to a specific URL or microsite saw the most increases in web traffic during and after the game
• Based on plans released by advertisers, “cliffhangers” appear to be on the rise over last year

“With Akamai Technologies' distributed network, GoDaddy.com was able to quickly serve and document massive traffic spikes to our Website during the Super Bowl last year,” said GoDaddy.com President and COO Warren Adelman. “In today's advertising climate, getting viewers to the site is the bottom line.”

“As one of the most anticipated and expensive advertising events, the Super Bowl presents an opportunity for companies to not only build brand awareness, but engage consumers in a variety of ways long after the advertisement airs,” said Brad Rinklin, vice president of marketing at Akamai. “Integrating an online component into the ad can significantly increase consumer interactivity and ongoing residual benefits, as well as offers the ability to measure the ad’s effectiveness. As these online advertisements become increasingly media-rich and dynamic through the use of Flash, Flex, AJAX and other Web 2.0 technologies, site optimization and availability are compulsory to ensure a positive consumer experience and brand enhancement.”