How 2016 Super Bowl Commercials Affected Advertisers' Website Load Times

On average, brands who advertised during the 2016 Superbowl saw their site’s page load time increase by 38% during the hour following their advertising spot. High traffic levels directly contribute to increases in page response time. Out of the 43 brands we measured on Super Bowl Sunday, 20 of these, including Quicken Loans and Apartments.com had a decline in site performance. We constantly measured the performance of each Super Bowl advertiser's site to show you how traffic attributed to commercials impacted page load times. 

Methodology

• Date: 2/7/2016 (Super Bowl Sunday)
• Sites Measured: 43
• Measurements Times and Locations: Multi-Hour from various US locations
• Time Zone: Eastern Standard Time
• Reported Metric: Geometric Mean

Please Note: Each time stamp represents an hour's worth of measurements. Example: 7:00pm measurements represent all measurements between 7:00pm and 7:59pm.

Overview

• Avg. Page Speed Impact After Ad Ran: + 37.5% Page Load Time
• Largest Slowdown after Ad Ran: Quicken Loans: 0.438 sec to 5.31 sec
• Largest Page Speed Improvement after Ad Ran: Audi: 2.42 sec to 2.04 sec
• Slowest Site During Super Bowl: Fitbit: 10.69 sec
• Fastest Site During Super Bowl: Heinz: 1.67 sec

Industry Overview

The commercial landscape was dominated by ads within the Food/Beverage, Financial, and Automobile industries. Here is their performance in greater detail:

Performance Matters

Performance directly impacts user experience and revenue. Here at Blue Triangle, we quantify where and how much page speed impacts online businesses. In fact, we've discovered over $300 million in revenue opportunity from performance improvements so far this year. Find out more about what we do and how we do it by scheduling a demo.