In case you’ve been living under a rock, Reddit has been having a moment on the internet.
The discussion platform went viral last month for its stint in the stock market which disrupted Wall Street giants. Just when you thought Reddit couldn’t get anymore iconic, they made their mark on America’s largest televised event, the Super Bowl. To top it off, the commercial only lasted for five seconds — going down as the shortest Super Bowl ad in history.
So what did they advertise? Just a few paragraphs of text on the familiar Reddit post format. But unless you have photographic memory, you wouldn’t have been able to read everything in five seconds. They had bet that viewers would either pause or rewind the commercial just to catch the message. According to the ad placement, they spent their entire marketing budget to make this bold move.
Their description on YouTube reads, “We made an ad – albeit a 5-second one – for this year’s Big Football Thing. Thank you to our communities who inspire us to pull off crazy stunts, like buying a really expensive media placement three days before kickoff.”
For context, it was reported that a 30-second Super Bowl ad costs $5.5M. Which means Reddit could’ve spent around $915,000 on this bet alone. Looks like it paid off because it was a hit on social media. Twitter users shared that they actually did go back to pause the commercial.
The reddit ad was great- had to go back and read it. Brilliant add #reddit
— Pedro (@ninthstringrb) February 8, 2021
The 5 second Super Bowl ad by @reddit. Kind of brilliant if enough people paused/shared it like I did! #SuperBowl #Reddit pic.twitter.com/zH1oRjGZPC
— Adam Rosen (@ARos13_) February 8, 2021
I can't be the only one who actually paused this to read it. I can't be the only one who felt immensely proud reading this #reddit pic.twitter.com/Jh8cmMZTlR
— Syanide Shadow (@SyanideShadow) February 8, 2021
Me watching that Reddit ad 😂 #reddit #redditad pic.twitter.com/5m1rkgDzE6
— Brandon Hofman (@brandon_hofman) February 8, 2021
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