Brief:

• Pantone, the color standards company, posted "color commentary" on social media during last night's Super Bowl between the Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers. The company's first campaign for the big game highlighted how the primary color of both teams was red, or more specifically, Pantone 186 C for the Chiefs and Pantone 187 C for the 49ers, Digital Agency Network reported.
• Pantone used the hashtag #BigGameColorCommentary in tweets that highlighted its knowledge about colors in play-by-plays, Super Bowl facts, popular food on game day and Super Bowl ads. For example, Pantone highlighted that Little Caesars, which ran a commercial during the game, used Pantone 3564 C in its colors scheme, and that Heinz Ketchup used Pantone Heinz 57 red, among other call-outs.
• Pantone posted the commentary on its Twitter and Instagram Stories. The company partnered with agency of record Huge on the "Big Game Color Commentary" campaign.

Insight:

Pantone's color commentary sought to reach audiences who used their mobile devices for "second-screening" activities while watching the Super Bowl, leveraging the massive publicity for the NFL championship game that was forecast to reach 100 million viewers. While 72% of Super Bowl viewers were expected to watch the game on TV, 11% of the audience planned to either second-screen the game or watch it exclusively on a smartphone, a study by mobile video ad network AdColony found.

The most common mobile activities while watching TV are texting (29% of survey respondents), playing video games (28%) and browsing social media (27%), the survey found. Pantone's campaign may have helped to reach a younger audience while they watched the game.

Woah, woah, woah @reeses - was it PANTONE 16-1030 TSX, PANTONE 16-1439 TCX, PANTONE 19-0912 TCX, and… what now?#BigGameColorCommentary pic.twitter.com/LmrUQA3E8v

— PANTONE (@pantone) February 3, 2020

Pantone wasn't among the official sponsors who paid north of $5 million for a TV commercial during the game, but that didn't stand in the way of a counterprogramming strategy aiming to ride the buzz. Other brands developed social media campaigns to reach mobile users during the Super Bowl. Frank's RedHot, the brand of hot sauce made by McCormick, livestreamed a game show on Twitter that gave viewers a chance to win cash and other prizes. GlaxoSmithKline's Tums brand of antacids hosted a sweepstakes that asked Twitter users to rate moments during the big game that gave them the most heartburn.

The color commentary follows Pantone's other efforts to shape cultural conversations, such as its annual Color of the Year announcement that influences ad creative and product development among a variety of industry groups. The company's Pantone Color Institute predicts global color trends and advises companies on how to use color in their brand identities. The company claims that more than 10 million designers and producers rely on its products and services for inspiration. The company in December announced that classic blue, or Pantone 19-4052, was the Color of the Year for 2020 with its first immersive event.