Welcome to The Marketing Accelerator Podcast - Super Bowl Edition - featuring three insights in about three minutes. I'm Drew Dinkelacker.

The Super Bowl is the most watched event of the year, giving advertisers a rare chance to reach a mass audience in a fragmented media world. As a USA Today AdMeter voting panelist, I watch all 60+ commercials in a very short period of time, and this gives me a unique perspective on this year's crop of commercials and has left me with a few puzzling observations…as well as clarity.

First off, I like Dan Marino, former Miami Dolphins Hall of Famer, but do we really need to see him in two different spots, one for Mich Ultra and the other for M&M's? Is he in that kind of demand? Really? This duplicity happened again with the Flashdance splash theme featuring Jason Momoa in the T-Mobile spot, and this big gummy thingy in a weird Nerds spot that actually kind of worked.

But enough with what puzzled me. Let's move to a point of clarity:

In my Marketing Accelerator world, we frequently talk about drills and holes. Let me explain. Say you're at your local hardware store and you see a woman looking at drills. Does she really want a drill, or does she want a hole? So often, my clients want to talk about their drills and how great they are. But if she doesn't want a hole, then there's no reason to be looking at drills. So, it can be tricky finding the balance between talking about your drill and the hole that the customer wants. This is the art of marketing, and I think the Toyota Tacoma commercial is an artistic masterpiece in finding the balance. Every car has a handle on the passenger side, watch how they talk about the ubiquitous handle but get across the thrill that the driver is seeking.

(Watch the spot:)

Shut the front door! handle

Seriously, Rob! handle

Woah, woah, woah…woah, woah! handle

No me gusta (I don’t like it)! handle

The drill here is simply the handle, which happens to be attached to the most powerful Tacoma ever. The hole is the experience that the driver is receiving from their passengers. One simple handle, four dynamic, thrilled responses. Remember, it's the driver who makes the purchasing decision, not the passenger. When it comes to your message in the marketplace, do you need to add some hole to your drill? Something to think about.

The Marketing Accelerator Podcast is a production of MarketingAccelerator.com, where we provide strategic marketing insight to business leaders and their marketing leaders. I'm Drew Dinkelacker.