Cash4Gold.com

Welcome to the 2009 edition of SuperURLs. This year advertisers shelled out $3 million for their 30 seconds of glory during the big game. But did they get all their bang for their buck with prominently displayed URLs? By and large, the answer was a resounding no. Some didn't even include URLs at all.

And then you had the advertiser whose brand was an URL. While their spot may have been memorable (Ed McMahon and MC Hammer in da house!), their URL is certainly forgettable. You all know my general disdain for URLs with abbreviations and there's no abbreviation worse than IM lingo. As a rule of thumb if you have to tell people how to type the URL, it's time to get a new one. Especially when you're playing in the SuperBowl with so many other good ads vying for attention.

Check out this exerpt from the Cash4Gold.com spot as the announcer says, "Cash The Number Four Dot Com." While it's not quite the mouthful our last spoken URL was, this one sure wasted more money. Methinks this was a case of $3 million 4 naught.

GoDaddy.com

No-one knows how to milk a SuperBowl ad for everything it's worth than the Grand-URL Daddy of them all. For the second year in a row, GoDaddy used the female form to drive traffic directly to its site. And it made sure to keep its URL visible throughout most of the commercial. Presentation included both the logo (which features the URL) and the plain type (with requisite Leading Caps). When it comes to SuperURLs, GoDaddy is tops, pops.

bridgestonetire.com

At the other end of the spectrum is Bridgestone who, for the second year in a row, buried their URL in alllowercase at the bottom of the screen for the last 2 seconds of the spot. They may as well have not included it at all. With nothing more than a glance, the best someone will be able to make out is BridgestoneOnline.com (which is currently parked). This URL is tired and worn.

cargill.com/creates

The only thing worse than an alllowercase URL buried at the bottom of the screen for the last 2 seconds of the ad is an alllowercase URL buried at the bottom of the screen for the last 2 seconds of the ad with a slash. All Cargill creates here is confusion.

www.fastandfuriousmovie.net

The only thing worse than an alllowercase URL buried at the bottom of the screen for the last 2 seconds of the ad with a slash is an alllowercase Movie URL buried at the bottom of the screen for the last 2 seconds of the ad with dubs and a non-dot-com. (Am I reminding anyone of that CareerBuilder ad?) This URL flashes so fast and furiously across the screen, it's an accident waiting to happen.

ecomagination.com

alllowercase does not need to be the kiss of death, though. Here GE shows that some alternating fonts and prominent shelf, er... screen space can make all the difference in the world. All it takes is a little, ahem... URLmagination.

DISNEY.COM/WITCHMOUNTAIN

For some reason, Disney decided to get a little goofy with this URL. Not sure why it gave the Pixar flick top billing in terms of URL promotion but trying to hone in on this URL what with the low visibility placement and ALLCAPS format is like trying to find a needle in a, er... witch mountain.

NFL.MONSTER.COM

Now, not all multi-word ALLCAPS URLs are the stuff of witchcraft. Here Monster does a good job of driving traffic to this specific promotional page by using a subdomain. This ensures that people will not get lost somewhere else on Monster.com and also allows them to promote this particular sweeps without having to devote previous homepage real-estate like Disney did. This URL keeps on truckin'.

monster.com

And here's Monster just focusing on its brand. Nice clean display. Addition of dot-com after the logo. And voiceover reinforcement. Good slogan to boot (will get around to updating Good Slogan Bad Slogan with all the SuperSlogans sometime soon). This URL is demonsterably good.

HyundaiGenesis.com

Hyundai did a great job of URL selection and promotion here. An easy-to-read URL complements the compellling call-to-action -- buy a Hyundai and if you lose your income, simply return the car with no impact your credit. Could this be the next chapter in marketing?

HyundaiUSA.com

Hyundai goes 2 for 2 with Leading Caps and no dubs trumping the Bad URL Selection inherent in tacking USA on here. Bruce Springstein, who rocked the halftime show, would be proud that they're showcasing where this URL was born.

edgemonkeys.com

Here's a case where alllowercase overshadows a pretty good URL selection. The monkeys in this spot are definitely memorable. But the viewer is probably not expecting a URL having to do with them, rather thinking it would be Castrol-something. If I were the creative director here, when it came to careful URL display, I'd have been all over it like stink on a monkey.

TheSlowskys.com

Here's another case of Leading Caps overcoming minimal screen capture. This is really more of a branding ad than a DR which is why I won't fault them for making the slogan the emphasis here. They allow you to gravitate to this URL at your own pace.

CHEETOS.COM

Monkeys and turtles, now cheetahs, oh my! While Chester was a bit molestor-ish in this ad (cheez it, the cops!), the URL was pretty clean-cut. And the "Let Loose at" call-to-action makes sure the URL isn't crunched for space. Sorry, that was cheesy.

usanetwork.com

Here's a case where USA is the brand so clearly it needs to be in the URL and I won't begrudge them using "Network" as I'm sure USA.com would've cost them a pretty penny. But burying the URL in alllowercase at the bottom of the screen in faint white font is not going to resonate. Characters may be welcome but they don't exactly roll out the red carpet for web visitors.

ActivelySafe.com

This commercial aired in the local Chicago area pod so you may not have seen it. Pretty straightforward -- clean URL with Leading Caps reinforcing the brand positioning. Goes to show you don't have to reinvent the wheel when choosing and promoting your URL.

www.fourseasonsheating.com

Here's another spot that ran during our local pod. They scored points by using alternating fonts but got thrown for a loss by including the dubs and fumbled the URL selection by prioritizing heating over air conditioning -- talk about fair-weather fans!

teleflora.com

Props to Teleflora for their risque off-color spot ("No-one wants to see you naked!") Fixing the URL in the bottom right corner throughout and putting it front and center at the end really helped it pop. Glad to see they didn't just phone it in.

refresheverything.com

Pepsi almost did everything right here. Funny ad (love physical humor!) Prominent URL display. Good tie-in with their slogan. But using alllowercase mushes the words together. If only they could refresh this last frame.

UNIVERSALHEROES.COM

I'm tempted to let Universal off the hook for its use of ALLCAPS given that both its brand name and the TV show it's tying in with use ALLCAPS in the logos. But the words just blend together too much. Truly tragic.