Michelob Ultra’s First Shoppable TV Ads, Leaning on QR Codes for the Big Game

Instacart and Michelob Ultra collaborated to create shoppable television commercials to coincide with Anheuser-Busch InBev's Super Bowl LVII advertising. This is the first major CPG co-marketing campaign for Instacart, North America's leading grocery technology company. It allows certain brands to collaborate with the company during key tentpole moments. Michelob Ultra is the first partner to create an Instacart co-marketing campaign. It will run during the NFL football playoffs and feature Anheuser-Busch's first-ever shoppable TV commercials, all powered by Instacart.

The collaboration demonstrates that Instacart is the one-stop shop for all football viewing party needs.

During the NFL playoffs, Michelob Ultra's new TV commercials star former NFL quarterback Tony Romo, women's soccer player Alex Morgan, and boxer Canelo Alvarez, and feature Instacart as the delivery partner of choice and encourage consumers to stock up on Ultra by scanning a QR code.

The QR code takes viewers to a Michelob Ultra page on Instacart, where they can add their game-day favourites, such as the new Michelob Ultra golf pack and Michelob Ultra Organic Seltzers and Michelob Ultra Pure Gold Light Lager, to their cart. In collaboration with PepsiCo, the page also includes game-day staples like Tostitos and classic Frito Lay chips that pair well with Ultra.

The partnership also includes shoppable media on the Instacart app, push notifications, and social content. It also demonstrates Instacart’s continued interest in QR codes in TV advertisements.

To make that massive marketing investment pay off, many brands started releasing their Super Bowl ad campaigns early this time. In that line, Instacart and Michelob Ultra’s shoppable TV commercials for this season come early and rely on QR codes for this big game.

Basically, shoppable ads help brands increase their average order value as they allow them to showcase multiple complementary products in a single sponsored ad and reach larger audiences for new products. Along with that, it is easily trackable and attributable for marketers.

Now, as more U.S. households became acquainted with QR codes as connected TV grew in popularity in recent years, we anticipate that this move by Michelob Ultra and Instacart will be highly beneficial for both marketers and users in a variety of ways.

Some of them are

Convenience: QR Codes provide a convenient, one-step process for directing users to buy the product they wish to. It makes the whole buying process easy for users. Because it eliminates the time or need for your target audiences to call, message, or otherwise contact the brand to purchase the products they want.

Boost customer engagement: QR codes play a crucial role in increasing customer engagement. Just by converting the URL to a QR code, brands get the capability to drive traffic and brand awareness to their business in a very easy way. It also provides marketers with the capability to convert offline engagement into conversions.

Capture Data: Data about target audiences, like their phone number or the products they showed interest in, can be captured by marketers. Which, they can use later to keep interacting with the user to promote the offers or limited-time discounts and optimize the marketing campaigns accordingly to increase sales.

However, the short length of some advertisements remains a significant barrier to user adoption of QR codes. Because of this, the consumer is less likely to reach for their phone or open their camera app in time to scan a QR code. Thus, many brands explore different use cases with QR codes and push out many offers via QR codes on shoppable TV ads.

In fact, just like Michelob, many other brands, like Web3 gaming company Limit Break and Comcast’s NBC Universal (NBCU), utilize QR codes for this big game as the CTV advertising ecosystem grows busy in today’s market.

In essence, we believe Michelob Ultra’s new approach with QR codes is on track and not far away from revolutionising the world of shoppable TV ads.