| Priscilla Ramirez 
Last weekend, more than 110 million viewers — football fans and non-fans alike — tuned into the NFL Championship Game, the most-watched sporting event of the year and the third most-watched television broadcast in U.S. history. Whether you were among those who celebrated their team's victory, grieved at defeat or didn't even know who competed, you likely stuck around for the commercials, which are among the most anticipated of the year. For some, watching the commercials is a bigger tradition than the big game itself. These commercials aren’t just a paid media opportunity, though. With so much attention placed on the game, companies can also score big on social and earned media channels. For days after the game, media outlets and influencers (advertising, entertainment and general media alike) discuss which ads worked, which didn’t, and the results they generated for their brands. Previously featured on Content We Love for their #EqualDreams campaign, Esurance once again lands in the spotlight with how they took the multichannel promotion of their Pass It On Sweepstakes to a whole new level before, during and after the big game. Esurance’s pre- and post-game commercials featured various scenarios where people unexpectedly stopped what they were doing to catch a football made of money. The commercials were a tribute to the Esurance Pass It On Sweepstakes, a clever incentive to persuade people to retweet messages from the Esurance Twitter handle using #EsuranceSweepstakes. 
The sweepstakes, which kicked off Feb. 4, had already selected 16 winners of $50,000. Esurance then surprised viewers with a post-game commercial featuring the hilarious anti-hero of the newly released comic book movie, Deadpool, along with the announcement that they would be giving away a grand prize of $250,000 to one lucky winner, pushing the sweepstakes into overtime. However, Esurance didn’t just limit their post-game promotion to social and television channels. To drive additional online engagement and deliver everything the media would need to cover their story, Esurance packaged images, a dynamic call to action to enter the sweepstakes, and links to their video within this multimedia news release. "Bookending the big game gave us the flexibility to develop a real-time integrated experience and be a part of the conversation before, during and after the game, while also driving awareness of our brand and experience," said Nancy Abraham, Vice President of Integrated Marketing Communications at Esurance. "This event is the biggest media stage of the year and it offers us the opportunity to efficiently reach a very large audience while making them aware that, because of our innovative tools and the experts you can talk with 24/7, Esurance is the smarter choice for insurance in today's modern world." Esurance garnered major recognition by tapping not only into the big game’s media opportunities, but also the Deadpool movie’s all-out marketing blitz. In the end, Esurance’s sweepstakes strategy drove huge engagement and social presence numbers, generating more than 9,000 Tweets per minute at its peak and trending nationally on Twitter. The third quarter saw the most entries with nearly 350,000 people retweeting for chances to win, which helped to bring total mentions of the branded hashtag #EsuranceSweepstakes to nearly 2 million. It also landed Esurance coverage on media outlets, like this CNBC article featuring Esurance as the most talked about big game brand, even though their commercial didn’t run during the game. As we see with this and Esurance’s previously featured content, such success stories demonstrate the company’s ability to leverage a variety of events and news stories to maximize media coverage, brand awareness, and audience action. You too can create content your audience will love. Download our guide Driving Credibility & Success for Your Brand: How to Earn More Media for more tips on crafting a winning PR and marketing strategy. Author Priscilla Ramirez is a customer success representative for channel and advocacy marketing at PR Newswire. | 
