Patrick Mahomes may have watched the Super Bowl from the couch (sorry, Swifties), but one thing that was entirely predictable about this year’s game was it being the biggest advertising event of the year. An estimated 127.7 million viewers tuned in (NBC hasn’t released official figures as of publishing.) But even before anyone thought we’d be witnessing the New England Patriots return to the big stage to face Sam Darnold and the Seattle Seahawks, ad inventory was long gone. Unprecedented advertiser demand helped NBCUniversal sell out Super Bowl spots before the NFL season even kicked off, reinforcing just how valuable live sports remain for brands looking for reach and scale.
What that level of demand ultimately shows is that the Super Bowl is no longer a distant aspiration for brands (although it still may be for the New York Jets). Live sports remain the most powerful stage in advertising, but just as the way TV viewing habits have evolved, so has the way brands can show up in the game. Last year proved that streaming could deliver real reach and performance on Super Bowl Sunday, opening the door for advertisers that may not have previously considered the game within reach.
This year, advertisers approached the Super Bowl in different ways. Some leaned into traditional linear for maximum scale. Others opted for streaming-only placements as a more cost-effective way to be part of the game. And some combined both for added reach and flexibility. Making any of those strategies work takes more than a DSP or a programmatic bid. Super Bowl inventory is tightly controlled and transacted directly with the networks, which is why Tatari builds deep, long-term relationships with publishers like NBCUniversal to secure and manage these placements well in advance.
For brands like Manscaped, Life360, Tecovas, and Ro, a Super Bowl spot wasn’t a one-off gamble. These aren’t legacy advertisers that can rely on decades of brand equity to justify the spend. Each built toward the moment by testing TV, learning what drove performance, and gradually moving into bigger stages like live sports as confidence grew. That’s possible because of how TV works today: streaming and modern measurement make it easier to see what TV actually drives, from searches and site visits to installs and purchases, often in near real time. The Super Bowl becomes less of a one-night brand flex and more of a performance anchor, kicking off campaigns that build before kickoff and carry on well after the final whistle. For competitive reasons, conversion data remains confidential, but clients agreed to share immediate response rates as a directional signal of impact. With that in mind, let’s dive into some of the standout performances.
Manscaped
Linear + Streaming
Spot aired prior to the National Anthem.
MANSCAPED arrived at the Super Bowl with a clear point of view and no shortage of confidence. Known for creative that gets people talking, the brand treated its Super Bowl debut as the culmination of a long-standing TV strategy rather than a one-off stunt. MANSCAPED embraced TV early on, testing aggressively across live sports and entertainment, and quickly identified what scaled. That approach allowed the brand to balance performance-driven outcomes with brand-building moments, setting the foundation for larger tentpole investments. Weeks ahead of kickoff, MANSCAPED launched a full 360-degree rollout, using teaser creative and meme-driven social to signal its arrival before taking the biggest stage in advertising. And the results paid off.
Airing right before kickoff, MANSCAPED generated one of the strongest traffic surges across the entire Super Bowl window. Within the first 5 minutes after airing, their website had a 52X increase in visitors.
The brand capitalized on a moment when viewership was already peaking, but competitive ad clutter hadn’t yet set in. It also helped that they had one of the top-rated ads of the night. The result was impact before the first snap, reinforcing that well-timed pregame inventory can deliver performance on par with in-game placements.
Watch their Super Bowl creative
Life360
Streaming-only
Spot aired during the end of the 2nd quarter, right before halftime.
For Life360, the Super Bowl represented an opportunity to step into a cultural moment with a message that resonates with their target audience: parents. The family safety app chose a streaming-only placement, using the flexibility of streaming to test how a Super Bowl environment could drive both brand impact and business results. As Life360 has evolved from heavily DR-focused creative toward bolder, more brand-led storytelling, the Super Bowl offered a way to reach modern, connected families at scale while staying disciplined with their investment. The strategy reflected a broader shift in how brand-focused marketers can participate in the game on their own terms, using streaming to balance reach, efficiency, and measurable outcomes, as evident by the results of their first-ever Super Bowl spot.
Airing across Peacock leading up to halftime, Life360 saw very strong engagement. Within five minutes of airing, website traffic spiked 1,000% (11X) over baseline – proof that the midway point of the game can drive rapid, high-intent response.
Watch their Super Bowl creative
Tecovas
Streaming-only
Spot aired at the close of the 2nd quarter, right before halftime.
Tecovas’ path to the Super Bowl was shaped by cultural alignment as much as scale. The modern Western brand first broke out on TV through programming that mirrored its audience, including early success in shows like Yellowstone. From there, Tecovas leaned into sports television, where performance quickly followed, with marquee moments like the World Series delivering some of the strongest results in the brand’s history. Over the past year and a half, that success fueled a significant expansion in TV investment, with spend scaling meaningfully as confidence grew. The Super Bowl placement fits squarely within that evolution, offering the impact of the big game through a streaming environment that prioritized reach, frequency, and brand lift while maintaining financial discipline.
Tecovas demonstrated the strength of a streaming-only Super Bowl strategy in a big way.
Airing at the end of the first half of the game, and right before Bad Bunny took the stage, their spot generated as much response as other large sporting events that included both linear and streaming. Within five minutes of airing, Tecovas saw a 6,400% increase in visitors (65x) – a surge three times larger than their World Series placement running across linear and streaming.
Watch their Super Bowl creative
Ro
Linear + Streaming
Spot aired in the first quarter.
Ro’s Super Bowl debut on linear broadcast was the result of methodical testing and proven performance. The healthcare brand first entered the Super Bowl conversation last year through a streaming placement on Tubi, using the environment to understand how its creative and messaging resonated at the highest level. From there, Ro focused on hitting core performance benchmarks, scaling what worked, and expanding investment as confidence grew. As demand for GLP-1 treatments accelerated, Ro leaned into high-impact tentpole moments once performance was clearly validated. This year’s Super Bowl appearance represented the next step in that progression, pairing a mass-reach broadcast placement with a strategy rooted in disciplined growth rather than a single-night splash.
Their linear and streaming placement generated one of the highest traffic spikes Ro has ever observed, followed by a sustained post-airing lift that persisted for hours after the game concluded.
The game also outperformed other major sporting events they’ve run.
Visit volume from the Super Bowl substantially exceeded that of the NFL Championship, NFL Post-Season games, and the MLB World Series, reinforcing the Super Bowl’s unmatched ability to drive immediate consumer response.
In addition to driving record-breaking site traffic, Ro’s Super Bowl placement generated strong consumer search demand compared to competitors during the game, based on Google Trends analysis conducted by Tatari’s Data Science team.
Ro’s first-quarter Super Bowl ad produced a sharp and immediate spike in search interest, occurring earlier in the broadcast window than competitor brands. This spike was both more pronounced and more concentrated, signaling a higher level of immediate consumer intent following the ad.
While other brands also saw increases in search activity later in the game, Ro’s response stood out for both magnitude and timing. The strong search response aligned closely with the unprecedented spikes in visits provides a second, independent signal that the Super Bowl ad drove incremental consumer interest beyond baseline levels.
Watch their Super Bowl creative
The Real Work Happens After the Game
Tatari helps advertisers sustain momentum well after the game ends. Through retargeting, brands can re-engage viewers who saw their Super Bowl ad with follow-up TV ads designed to drive consideration and conversion. For Fiverr, this approach allowed Tatari to build on their initial Super Bowl spot, efficiently retargeting exposed audiences with additional creative to move them further down the funnel and optimize performance in the weeks that followed. And the impact doesn’t stop there. TV creates a powerful halo effect that amplifies other channels. In fact, more than half of Tatari’s clients see that their TV ads boost purchase conversion rates of other marketing channels by more than 50%.
That data-driven mindset mattered even more this year. With NBC requiring Super Bowl advertisers to commit to a match spend across their broader portfolio including the Olympics, Tatari relies on years of historical performance data and rigorous testing to inform where incremental dollars are allocated, helping advertisers make smarter decisions about how and where those investments are put to work.
Planning the Path to Super Bowl LXI Starts Now
Looking ahead, the forces that reshaped this year’s Super Bowl will only intensify. Streaming will continue to play a bigger role, opening the door for even more first-time advertisers to enter the game, but access will come with added complexity. With the Super Bowl set to move to Disney properties, including ABC and ESPN – which the NFL now owns a 10% stake in, Super Bowl ad inventory will become more competitive and harder to navigate. That means the brands that win next year will be the ones building their TV strategy now – testing, learning, and mapping a clear path across both linear and streaming. As the Super Bowl evolves, Tatari is built to help brands keep up, cut through the complexity, and turn the biggest stage in advertising into a repeatable growth opportunity.
Let’s game plan your Super Bowl strategy.
