And the winner of the Hottest Super Bowl Ad* Award is ….

You can still dunk in the dark. At the Super Bowl.

OREO!

*On Facebook and Twitter

Now I have to admit I am not much of a football or Super Bowl person. But as a marketing nerd, obviously I’m watching what’s going on from the sidelines — especially on social media!

And when the lights went out in New Orleans (did Beyoncé blow a fuse?) giving America a longer potty break than usual, smart brands knew that mobile devices and laptops would be humming with activity. 

Oreo’s team swooped in and dropped the above photo on the unsuspecting Facebook- and Twitterspheres.

Just absolutely brilliant. Timely, humorous, great design … and almost 15,000 likes and nearly 5,000 shares. And climbing. Not to mention that a *lot* of people were left craving an Oreo cookie!

Oreos — the (un)official cookie of Super Bowl XLVII!

What outstanding examples of social media use did you see during the Super Bowl? What would you have done?

*Honorable mention goes to Duracell, which went to Facebook with a photo of the darkened half of the Superdome plus the text, “If only Duracell was powering the lights …” and then cheekily added “Looks like they used some Duracell batteries! You’re welcome. Enjoy the game. #TrustYourPower” once the lights came back on.

UPDATE:

Excellent coverage of how Oreo did it from Rachel Sanders at BuzzFeed.

HubSpot offers a solid replay of brands that jumped on the blackout.