In rare diversion into the world of sports advertising, this week's post has been prompted by the looming collision between the Patriots and the Eagles in Super Bowl LII. Last year Kantar Media calculated that the cost of 30 seconds airtime during Gridiron's showpiece event doubled from $2.4M in 2007 to $4.8M in 2016. In 2017 rates inched up again to pass $5M. Those are big headlines for buyers to accept, even if the increase is spread over a decade or more. Taking the latest view of ad rates as a starting point, we can dig into the

numbers to understand how advertisers are making their calculations and where rates will go over the next few years.  Switching to a CPM view of costs First up, let's consider the increase in the cost of a 30 seconds slot against the growth in the size of the television audience. In 2007, the price of advertising to the Super Bowl's 93 million TV viewers in the US was $2.4M for a 30 seconds slot. By 2016, that cost had increased to $4.8M, but the size of the TV audience had also increased to 112 million (Nielsen). Using a standard CPM model, the cost per thousand… read more »