While the Superbowl stands as a pinnacle for cultural engagement, consumers expect more (ad-specific tune-in down 8% from YAG). As viewer preferences shift, the traditional formula (comedy-celebrity-relevance) falls short. Enter CeraVe, disrupting norms by flipping the script and pranking the internet. Through paid influencers & reach-driving channels across a three-phased flighting strategy, CeraVe sparked buzz and redefined the boundaries of media storytelling. In a landscape where attention = currency, CeraVe used Super Bowl, the largest platform, to drive visibility & business momentum while maintaining the brand’s identity as the #1 dermatologist-recommended skincare brand.

Acquired by L’Oreal in 2017, CeraVe has experienced remarkable growth, with significant opportunity to enhance visibility with new consumers while maintaining its identity as the #1 dermatologist-recommended skincare brand.

CeraVe has become synonymous with cultural relevance, evidenced by strong social conversation and engagement. The challenge remained maintaining sustained cultural momentum and taking brand to new heights.

Super Bowl has historically been a massive cultural moment for brands to engage with, not just because of the large viewership, but audiences tune specifically to watch ads. In parallel, it was an opportune time algin with both sports (In 2022, 99 of the top 100 programs were sports-related) and specifically the NFL. The attendance of Taylor Swift to Kansas City Chiefs games to watch her boyfriend Travis Kelce play has had a significant impact on NFL viewership overall - the NFL saying that regular season viewership was up 7 percent from last season, according to Nielsen data.

This was the PERFECT time for CeraVe to activate its first-ever Super Bowl campaign.

CeraVe has experienced remarkable growth, becoming the #1 mass skincare brand, yet has an opportunity to build awareness and recruit new households, while reinforcing the brand's medical roots as the #1 dermatologist-recommended skincare brand.

CeraVe needed to move at the speed of culture to expand reach and drive business growth. CeraVe had historically activated brand-created tentpoles to educate/entertain consumers, but wanted to expand into general-market tentpoles to reach new users, while still supporting the brand’s iconic Moisturizing Cream.

Aligning with live-sports was a natural choice for CeraVe to recruit new consumers in relevant moments, specifically among male & multicultural consumers. In 2022, 99 of the top 100 programs were sports-related, highlighting the enduring appeal. Moreover, the 2023 Super Bowl experienced record-breaking viewership, which would enable CeraVe to reach ~34% of its target audience in a single broadcast and, done right, would cement CeraVe as a cultural icon and household name.

“Michael CeraVe”

CeraVe skincare was making its Super Bowl Debut. The goal was for everyone to know it’s

developed with dermatologists. The problem was, the Super Bowl is packed with A-List

celebrities. And Dermatologists are (how do we put this nicely…) not as alluring as celebs.

So we re-wrote the Super Bowl Playbook with a first-of-its-kind campaign. While most brands

tease their spot a week before the game, we spent the month leading up to the game spreading

a conspiracy that CeraVe was developed by Michael Cera. But Michael Cera isn’t on social media. So how could we get this conspiracy online when our celebrity wasn’t there? We leaned into a robust 360 PR, social, and media strategy to get the word out.

To captivate consumers, reach new audiences, while reinvigorating loyalists, CeraVe implemented a three-phased approach for the Michael CeraVe campaign, with an activation strategy to drive as much reach and buzz, without revealing the conspiracy too early. The 360-campaign strategy synchronized tactics across the phases to support building, amplifying, and sustaining buzz, both ahead of and after the game.

Once the story was revealed upon the spot airing in-game, our media strategy was to drive as much reach on the creative story as possible and sustain the buzz that had been built in the month leading up. The day after Super Bowl was our highest impact day for paid media, capitalizing on the historically high traffic of consumers going to re-watch the ads (for example, day-after Super Bowl is historically YouTube’s #1 most trafficked day around the game) and serving to consumers going to rewatch clips and highlights from the game.

The campaign began a month before Super Bowl with influencers fueling speculation that Michael Cera developed CeraVe. The rumors showed up in Pop Culture and the Morning Brew, all questioning if Michael was the founder. CeraVe used their owned channels to deny claims and fight back.

Enter phase 2, where the campaign sent dermatologist TikTokers to refute Michael. To amplify CeraVe's response as the dermatologist-backed brand and immerse its A18-49 audience in the story, this phase used high-reach channels (social media and out-of-home), along with high-touch platforms (Search).

The campaign culminated with CeraVe’s first-ever Super Bowl spot unveiling the brand/celebrity prank to ~34% of its audience; using media to extend the message 4-weeks post-game (planned reach of ~46%) and leveraging endemic sports/pop-culture outlets to create ongoing brand prominence and engagement. The media activation incorporated a combination of tried-and-true partners and new tactics CeraVe hadn’t run before to create fan-first interactions.

While most brands rely on the Super Bowl spot itself, CeraVe’s was used as the culmination of an “ultra meta prolonged marketing campaign” (NYTimes), being hailed a marketing “Masterclass” (adweek). The campaign resulted in 1.44 billion paid media impressions, 798 million video views, a +9% lift in aided brand awareness,* and +18% lift in brand favorability.* CeraVe U.S. broke their sales record for the most moisturizers sold in a week post-Super Bowl.

Aligning with Super Bowl also proved successful. Our 30s in-game ad was part of Superbowl’s highest viewership record with 123.7 million viewers, making it the most-watched telecast in 55 years** – underscoring the effectiveness of the cultural moment as a platform to recruit new CeraVe households.

The ad was celebrated as the best spot by Adweek, Forbes, and AdAge, earning a 5-star rating and the prestigious Ad Age Super CLIOs Award, a testament to its creativity and impact.