Our friends at Unruly Media have some data to share for advertisers concerning the Super Bowl.  The video measurement company is releasing these stats in tandem with their 2013 Super Bowl Playbook, which we will also cover soon.  Last year, Super Bowl ads became bigger than ever, as Unruly reports a 129% increase in shares for Super Bowl ads in 2012 from 2011’s numbers.  But Unruly found some very interesting stats that might surprise you.  Like, for instance, did you know that that initial burst of views that happen before and after the Super Bowl isn’t nearly the bulk of an ad’s overall views?

Unruly’s Top 10 Facts You Should Know About Super Bowl Advertising

Here’s how Unruly breaks it down:

1. 129% increase of shares 2011-2012 year on year.

Perhaps buoyed by the success of VW’s “The Force” in the previous year, many companies got their act online and promoted their ads like they had never done before.

2. 75% of the Top 20 most shared ads were launched before the Super Bowl.

Yeah, there’s absolutely no reason to wait until the Super Bowl to show your ad anymore.  You’re paying a ton of money to get the thing on the Super Bowl and get those tens, possibly hundreds, of millions of people watching it.  But by promoting it early, you can build a lot of buzz for the ad and gets millions of people watching it even before the game.

3. The top 4 most shared ads also had teaser videos, and 7 of the top 10 used teasers.

The most memorable were the ones featuring Matthew Broderick, teasing a Ferris-Beuller’s-Day-Off-style ad for what would eventually be the Honda CR-V ad that got so much attention, and VW’s teaser featuring dogs singing the “Darth Vader theme,” which would eventually be their hybrid dog/Star Wars ad.  Teasers get people talking, speculating, and they generate a ton of views on their own.

4. VW’s teaser actually ended up getting shared more than the Super Bowl ad.

This one:

Beat this one:

Three times more shares, actually.  That’s amazing.

5. 55% of Super Bowl 2012 shares came after March 1.

You might say, well, that’s more time to share an ad.  True, true, but also consider that the tremendous interest leveraged from the Super Bowl has died down by then, so this stat is amazing.  It shows that if you make great, memorable content, it can play all year.

6. 92% of shares came from the top 20 Super Bowl ads.

What this means is that there is a lot of room for many brands to try to get a piece of this pie.  Brands should be using online more, especially since it’s free and promotion of great content can lead to tons of extra views.

7. Automotive was the most shared vertical of 2012, a 137.5% increase from 2011.

Brands like Honda, Chevrolet, and VW dominated this category.  This is another area where competing car companies could do better, because only a few brands dominate the landscape.

8. Speaking of which, VW is the most shared brand over the last 2 years.

In 2011, VW led Chrysler and Doritos by a large margin.  In 2012, VW edged out Chevrolet and Honda.

9. The top 10 Super Bowl ads of 2012 were on average 83 seconds long, up 31 seconds from 2011.

With online video, brands can tell a longer story, putting extra stuff they couldn’t fit into their Super Bowl ad, and people are more likely to watch the ad when it’s not the same, old 30-second ad they saw on TV.

10. VW’s “The Force” is the most shared Super Bowl ad and most shared ad of all time.

Unruly measured it at 5.57 million shares, with VW Passats increasing sales by 116%.

I’m looking forward to seeing what Unruly has found for advertisers in their playbook, and of course, what advertisers have in store for 2013.