The pop of the bottle opening. The gentle glug-glug-fizz as you decant the golden liquid. The foamy head; the condensation on the glass. You just can’t beat a frosty beer on a hot summer’s day.
Beer-related searches on Google spike during the hottest months of the year…
…and with International Beer Day still in our recent memory (who knew?), we decided to use Adbeat’s competitive intelligence data to analyze the display ad strategies of three of America’s biggest beer brands:
- Guinness
- Bud Light
- Modelo
We looked specifically at US-targeted campaigns in the six months to July 2, 2024. Read on to learn about their spending strategies, ad networks, publishers, and the creatives and landing pages they use to reach, engage, and convert audiences.
Salud!
Guinness
Ad spend and networks
Guinness invested an estimated $427,000 in display ads over the last six months — but almost all of that budget has been spent since the start of May:
The majority of those ad bucks were dedicated to programmatic, while about one-quarter was spent on video ads. And almost all went toward Google’s Display & Video 360 (DV360) network.
Publishers
When it comes to publishers, Guinness prioritizes big names in the food and drink space, with about one-third of their budget spent on placements on a single website: Allrecipes.
Their ads mostly appear on recipes, rather than anything specifically alcohol-related. Seems they’re all about promoting Guinness as an accompaniment to a delicious meal or a food-based social occasion, rather than just encouraging people to drink it for the craic.
The exception to the rule is People. The celebrity news site’s audience skews young (half of visitors are aged under 44) and female (an estimated two-thirds of users are women) — a far cry from the traditional image of an old guy in a flat cap sipping a pint of the black stuff in a smoky pub.
Significantly, Guinness says it saw a 24 percent uptick in female customers in 2023, so it seems they’re actively courting a different audience as part of their growth plans.
Creatives
Standard
In terms of creatives, a single standard ad accounted for almost half of the brand’s entire display ad budget over the period we analyzed:
We can see why. The “lovely day” messaging makes it perfect for summer, while the creative shows off three separate Guinness products — including their alcohol-free offering, Guinness Zero.
Video
Guinness has created some of the most iconic commercials in history (who can forget the one with the surfer?).
And they’ve clearly spent big on their latest high-profile ad, fronted by Aquaman star Jason Momoa. The 15-second cut was the brand’s top video advert, attracting an estimated spend of almost $93,000 since the start of May:
But the big names don’t stop there, because Guinness has also enlisted Pro Football Hall of Famer Joe Montana to promote Guinness Zero:
Again, Guinness is happy to buck the trend here. The alcohol-free beer market has averaged annual growth of 31 percent over the past four years, largely driven by younger (non) drinkers. Joe Montana isn’t an obvious fit for targeting Gen-Z audiences, so it seems Guinness is aiming to boost sales of Zero among older consumers.
Landing Pages
The vast majority of Guinness ads send clickers to specific product pages, like this one for Guinness Zero, featuring CTAs to buy online, find nearby, or check out on Instacart:
Clearly, Guinness doesn’t just see display ads as a way to boost brand awareness — they want to drive online sales, too.
Once again, it seems the brand is ahead of the curve here, with US e-commerce sales of alcoholic drinks expected to grow 27 percent to almost $30 billion between 2024 and 2029.
Bud Light
Ad spend and networks
In the last six months, Bud Light spent an estimated $328,000 on display ads — the vast majority in the run-up to the Super Bowl:
Bud Light adopted a more diverse spending strategy than Guinness, with half their budget going on programmatic, one-third on video, and one-fifth on direct ads. They also used a mix of ad networks, dropping almost $140,000 on the Google Display Network, $75,000 on YouTube, and $68,000 on Direct Buy.
Publishers
If Guinness wants to expand its reach by tapping into unexpected demographics, Bud Light is seemingly hell-bent on recapturing its traditional target audience of young-ish men. Four of Bud Light’s top five publishers are sports-specific websites, while their entire YouTube budget was spent on sports channels MMA Weekly and UFC:
This is hardly surprising given the massive decline in sales provoked by the Bud Light boycott, which saw the brand lose its status as America’s top-selling beer.
Creatives
Standard
The brand’s top standard ad, with an estimated budget of just over $14,000, was this banner promoting a competition to win Super Bowl tickets:
Interestingly, the ad is pretty low on Bud Light branding — there’s just the tiny beer can and the seat logo.
By contrast, they also published a bunch of evergreen ads, each of which looks more or less like this:
These ads go heavy on the product and the brand’s “Easy to drink, easy to enjoy” tagline, introduced ahead of the 2023 Super Bowl.
Video
Bud Light spent approximately one-quarter of its whole display budget for the period on a video ad fronted by another Pro Football Hall of Famer, Peyton Manning:
It’s the definition of a safe bet. Which is no big surprise in the wake of the boycott.
Post-Super Bowl, they’ve mostly splashed the cash on a new, lighthearted ad featuring rapper Post Malone and a whimsical character called the “Bud Light Genie”:
It lacks the originality of classic Bud ads like “Wazzup?” and the croaking Budweiser frogs, but it’s a crowd-pleaser: mildly amusing and uncontroversial. That’s probably what the brand needs right now.
Landing Pages
Like Guinness, Bud Light clearly sees display ads as a reliable way to drive immediate sales. Outside of the previously mentioned Super Bowl competition, the brand largely steers audiences toward its “locator” page, where customers can order various Bud Light products from nearby stores:
Modelo
Ad spend and networks
Guess which brand replaced Bud Light as America’s top-selling beer? That’s right: Modelo Especial, which saw a 12 percent sales increase for the year through April 7.
Modelo is evidently eager to solidify its newfound position as market leader, dropping over $269,000 on display ads in the last six months:
Unlike the other brands in our analysis, Modelo spent heavily on video, with YouTube accounting for more than half of their display ad budget over the period.
Publishers
Modelo’s choice of publishers suggests they’re actively courting a younger audience.
YouTube is the clear #1, with their top channels including Brazilian record label Love Funk and Italian rapper Baby Gang. Nope, I’ve never heard of him either. But with 1.9+ million YouTube subscribers and over 2.5 million followers on Instagram, he’s clearly a big deal.
Elsewhere in the top five are streetwear site Hypebeast and sports database StatMuse, which is big with Gen Z and Millennial men.
In other words, Modelo’s publisher strategy is like a more extreme version of what Guinness is doing. They don’t seem particularly interested in reaching older drinkers — at least, not via display ads.
Creatives
Standard
Modelo’s top-spending standard ads mostly look something like this:
With plenty of visible branding, a prominent tagline, and no CTA, these ads are clearly all about boosting brand awareness.
We also found a bunch of standard ads reinforcing the brand’s sporting partnerships, like this one describing Modelo as the “fighting spirit of Raider nation”…
…and this one promoting their sponsorship of soccer club Columbus Crew:
Not only does the sports connection resonate with Modelo’s target audience, but it also helps the brand target customers in the geographic locations where those sports teams and franchises are based.
Video
Unlike Guinness and Bud Light, Modelo doesn’t bother with hiring big names for its video ads. Instead, the brand largely focused on promoting the new Chelada range — their take on the michelada, a classic Mexican cocktail:
Modelo’s audience targeting strategy is obvious here, too. Just look at all those young, cool, sexy people hanging out with their Cheladas. And not a middle-aged former quarterback in sight.
Landing Pages
Just like Guinness and Bud Light, Modelo sends ad clickers to landing pages where they can purchase their favorite Modelo products or find out where to buy them in person:
Honestly, I find it hard to imagine ordering a crate of Modelo Especial via the internet. Surely you’d just go to the store? But 10 percent of 18 to 29-year-olds and one in six 30 to 49-year-olds say they’ve bought beer online, so perhaps I’m missing out.
Conclusion
Beer doesn’t change too much.
Sure, new products like Modelo Chelada grab our attention from time to time. But Guinness is one of the most popular beers on the planet — and it’s tasted pretty much the same for over 250 years.
However, the beer industry can’t afford to stand still. Consumer preferences are evolving fast and brands are fighting to reach new audiences. Our analysis demonstrated how Guinness and Modelo are both pursuing a younger customer base, and we’re guessing they’re not the only ones.
Now, whose round is it?
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