To be sure, the pressure is on for Groupon to become the household name for daily deals.

Awareness of LivingSocial recently spiked after the company leaned on its investor Amazon to stage a one-day deal that offered a $20 gift card for 10 bucks. Likewise, after Groupon spurned Google’s $6 billion takeover offer, the search giant is likely to build a daily deals competitor of its own.

So, when the Pittsburgh Steelers face off against the Green Bay Packers on Sunday, we know who will be paying really close attention to Groupon’s debut TV appearance.

Not just the viewers, who pay notoriously close attention to the interstitials, but Groupon’s investors, like Andreessen Horowitz, Battery Ventures, and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, all of which will be curious to see where their nearly $1 billion is going.

The idea of a Super Bowl commercial is smart if the cards are played right.

“The Super Bowl is an incredibly powerful venue for new and emerging companies. It’s a chance to step out on a national stage,” said Tim Calkins, a marketing professor at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, who blogged about some of the companies trying to make a big splash at this year’s game.

Since the company’s business is being replicated by dozens of clones in every major city, to varying degrees of success, it’s all about creating exposure and name recognition. ”Google has all the resources in the world. It’s hard to fight someone like that unless you have something to protect you….All you really have is a strong brand to fall back on,” Calkins said.

But it is not exactly a touchdown. There have been fumbles, and private companies backed by millions of dollars bring up bad memories of the dot-com days, when start-ups and newly minted IPOs failed to deliver on their promises.

Groupon will also have the hard job of creating an effective advertisement that tells its story without being too artsy.

“They’ve got a big creative challenge ahead to explain the product and deliver a benefit in a way that breaks through in the Super Bowl. If they aren’t careful, they will run an ad creative that’s interesting but doesn’t explain the product,” Calkins said.

UPDATE: Groupon posted one of the commercials it rejected today on its blog, which is confessions of a Groupon addict.

Groupon is not providing any of the details–like whether there will be a star or how it will explain what the company is all about–but it has hired CP+B and Publicis Groupe’s Starcom as the lead agencies to do the heavy lifting.

Whatever Groupon does, expect it to have a viral component that extends the momentum after the 30 seconds is up.

Take CP+B’s genius stunt it pulled for Burger King called the “Whopper Sacrifice.”

The campaign gave Facebook users an excuse to dump some of the random childhood buddies or co-workers that had friended you over the years in return for a free Whopper. If users removed 10 friends, they’d get the burger.

Only four days after launch, tens of thousands of people had been sacrificed.

On the flip side, it also runs the risk of selling something so well that it can’t meet the demand.

“If I were Groupon, I would have some pretty big offers coming up over the next week. If the ad is successful at bringing new customers to the site, you then want them to have a good experience,” Calkins said.

Groupon will also have to deal with a surge in traffic, or a spike in first-time orders that could result in a high number of customer service inquires.

When LivingSocial conducted its Amazon gift card offer, it learned this the hard way. The company’s systems were overloaded, leading to delayed confirmation emails, credit-card charges and customer service responses. It also had to weed out people who were trying to game the system by trying to buy more than one gift card. The surge can all be explained by the hundreds of thousands of novices hitting the site all at the same time.

Groupon’s commercial in the Super Bowl almost didn’t happen, managing to nab spare airtime only at the last minute, AdAge reports.

It’s banking on the spot to give it a nice bump. For last week, Groupon.com received about half, or 58.5 percent, of all U.S. visits when looking at a category of “group-buying sites.” LivingSocial received 25 percent, reports Experian Hitwise. Total visits for each of them were 5.45 million and 2.33 million, respectively. The Super Bowl viewership is orders of magnitude more. On Sunday, it’s supposed to beat last year’s record of more than 100 million viewers.

Much of Groupon’s publicity before this came from its high-profile business moves, which the company used to its best abilities to attract a mainstream audience. For example, the drama of Groupon’s rejection of Google resulted in at least two high-profile TV appearances for CEO Andrew Mason–the “Today Show” and “Charlie Rose.”

If you liked the “Mr. Creosote” sketch in “Monty Python’s Meaning of Life,” you’ll like this one. And if you didn’t…well, you’re like many other folks, some of whom complained loudly enough to get Microsoft (MSFT) to yank the ad, though it still lives in Google’s (GOOG) YouTube.

Microsoft’s explanation for the spot, and its removal, via an email to CNET:

We make a point of listening to our customers. We created the … video as a tongue-in-cheek look at the InPrivate Browsing feature of Internet Explorer 8, using the same irreverent humor that our customers told us they liked about other components of the Internet Explorer 8 marketing campaign. While much of the feedback to this particular piece of creative was positive, some of our customers found it offensive, so we have removed it.

A reminder: These spots are not the work of Crispin Porter + Bogusky, the high-profile ad shop that gets associated with most of Microsoft’s marketing work these days. They’re from Indiana-based Bradley and Montgomery and they’re directed by Bobcat Goldthwait, for whom I’ve already professed my admiration.

These were Goldthwait’s first commercials, though, and it will be interesting to see if he gets another shot. And in retrospect, he did hint that this might be coming when he talked to Techflash after the first of his browser ads hit the Web last month:

Well, the folks at (Bradley and Montgomery), the agency that wrote ‘em, I would have to credit them with my involvement, and also Microsoft. I think they were trying to do something that was a little less mainstream, and I think that’s (what led to) my involvement. Normally the corporate world is very frightened of hiring the dude from Police Academy to direct their stuff, so I’m flattered and I was really happy. There’s a couple more coming up, too, so I’m actually looking forward to those being released, because I think they’re a little more nutty in tone.

Want to see for yourself? Have at it. But don’t complain to us afterward.

In a new chapter to its ad campaign that will begin airing during the NCAA basketball playoffs on CBS (CBS) Thursday evening, Microsoft will begin hammering on a theme that could resonate in these times of economic hardship: how much less expensive Windows PCs are than Macs. For the commercials, Microsoft’s advertising agency, Crispin Porter + Bogusky, recruited prospective computer shoppers in the Los Angeles area through Craigslist and other sites, with a tantalizing offer to give them between $700 and $2,000 to purchase a new PC.

According to Brad Brooks, corporate vice president for Windows consumer product marketing at Microsoft, the agency told recruits it was a market research firm and didn’t mention it was working with Microsoft. The recruits were told they could keep whatever money they didn’t spend on a PC so they had incentives to look for good values.

Read the rest of this post

First, Microsoft tried ads starring Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates. Next it tried ads starring anonymous Windows fans.

Now, the next step? Why advertising starring anonymous Windows fans–created by anonymous Windows fans–of course.

MediaMemo likes the new batch, which are cobbled together from video clips that Windows users uploaded themselves.

But then again, MediaMemo has liked all of the ads that hotshot agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky has created for Microsoft (MSFT), and thinks that all of the blogosphere carping and cheering about the ads is a bit silly.

It’s also exactly what Crispin wanted us to do in the first place.

Anyway, see for yourself–and tell me what you think in the comments section (you’ll need to register to do so).

Full-length version:

Mini version:

A PC is not a stereotype. And neither are you. If you’re a PC, you belong to a community of more than a billion individuals, working, playing, and connecting. Doing their own thing. If you’re a PC, we want to celebrate you. So stand up.”

– Microsoft, “A PC is Not a Steroetype”

The irony is enough to make your head explode. The latest evolution of Microsoft’s (MSFT) new ad campaign–the one designed to seize back control of the Windows PC image that Apple has so mercilessly tarred and feathered–wasn’t even made on a PC.

It was made on a Mac. Metadata in the images of the stereotyped PC user featured on Microsoft’s “I’m a PC” site reveal that they were produced using Macs running Adobe Creative Suite 3, not PCs running Microsoft Expression Studio software.

My God. This is how Microsoft and its ad agency hope to turn Apple’s disparagement to their advantage?

I would have assumed that an advertising campaign touting Windows PCs over Macs would, you know, not be created on Macs. But then I don’t work for Microsoft. (To be fair, the Symbol devices Apple uses for roaming transactions in its retail stores do run Windows CE.

UPDATE: Microsoft issued the following statement on the matter:

As is common in almost all campaign workflow, agencies and production houses use a wide variety of software and hardware to create, edit and distribute content, including both Macs and PCs.”

UPDATE: More commentary from Daniel Eran Dilger over at Roughly Drafted, who notes that Microsoft has scrubbed the offending metadata from the images.

Previously:

• Seriously, Windows Is Just Another Way of Saying We Have Each Other?
• Which Do You Like Better, Steve: “No Mac for You!” or “Vista–Not That There’s Anything Wrong With That”?
• The Simple Life: Gates and Seinfeld, the Hilton and Richie of Tech

[Image credit: LuisDS/Flickr]

A PC is not a stereotype. And neither are you. If you’re a PC, you belong to a community of more than a billion individuals, working, playing, and connecting. Doing their own thing. If you’re a PC, we want to celebrate you. So stand up.”

– Microsoft, “A PC is Not a Steroetype”

The irony is enough to make your head explode. The latest evolution of Microsoft’s (MSFT) new ad campaign–the one designed to seize back control of the Windows PC image that Apple has so mercilessly tarred and feathered–wasn’t even made on a PC.

It was made on a Mac. Metadata in the images of the stereotyped PC user featured on Microsoft’s “I’m a PC” site reveal that they were produced using Macs running Adobe Creative Suite 3, not PCs running Microsoft Expression Studio software.

My God. This is how Microsoft and its ad agency hope to turn Apple’s disparagement to their advantage?

I would have assumed that an advertising campaign touting Windows PCs over Macs would, you know, not be created on Macs. But then I don’t work for Microsoft. (To be fair, the Symbol devices Apple uses for roaming transactions in its retail stores do run Windows CE.

UPDATE: Microsoft issued the following statement on the matter:

As is common in almost all campaign workflow, agencies and production houses use a wide variety of software and hardware to create, edit and distribute content, including both Macs and PCs.”

UPDATE: More commentary from Daniel Eran Dilger over at Roughly Drafted, who notes that Microsoft has scrubbed the offending metadata from the images.

Previously:

• Seriously, Windows Is Just Another Way of Saying We Have Each Other?
• Which Do You Like Better, Steve: “No Mac for You!” or “Vista–Not That There’s Anything Wrong With That”?
• The Simple Life: Gates and Seinfeld, the Hilton and Richie of Tech

[Image credit: LuisDS/Flickr]

Like the first ad in the campaign, “Shoe Circus,” this spot clearly isn’t intended to pitch anything. It’s meant to redeem and recondition Microsoft’s public image, which has been turned into a joke by Apple’s (AAPL) persistent and devastating mockery. Consider Cupertino’s latest “Get a Mac” ad in which John Hodgeman’s PC character presents a faux editorial, “Stop Switching to Mac!,” on Time.com, NYTimes.com and elsewhere.

How do you respond to something like that?

Perhaps by showing folks that you’re a market leader that’s not quite as stodgy as they’ve been lead to believe. “Just as somebody might tell a joke to lighten up a room or get somebody’s attention before changing gears, these first ads were designed to tap people on the shoulder and say, ‘Excuse me. We’re back and we’d love a few moments of your time,’ Windows Director Chris Flores explains. “Will seeing Bill and Jerry enjoy each other’s company make people run out and buy a new laptop? Or correct misperceptions some non-users might have about Windows Vista? Certainly not. We’d be crazy to think they would. That’s why we’re continuing the Mojave Experiment ads. That’s their job. And they do their job simply by giving people who’ve never done so an excuse to check out Windows Vista for themselves. But this campaign, when fully unveiled, will talk about Windows in all its forms. Not just the OS for PCs we happen to be shipping today. In fact, not just an OS. And not just on PCs. Simply put, this campaign isn’t about Windows Vista. It’s about Windows. That might not be what some folks were/are expecting. And it might be hard to believe given what you’ve seen so far. But remember, we have gone on record saying the broader campaign will ‘tell the Windows story’ and we intend to judge its success on that basis. In that light I think it’s pretty safe to conclude we don’t expect the little logo at the end of these spots to do all that work by itself.”

The success of Windows is our number one job. With SP1 and the work we’ve done with PC manufacturers and our software ecosystem, we’ve addressed device and application compatibility issues in Windows Vista. Now it’s time to tell our story. In the weeks ahead, we’ll launch a campaign to address any lingering doubts our customers may have about Windows Vista. And later this year, you’ll see a more comprehensive effort to redefine the meaning and value of Windows for our customers.”

– Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, July 23, 2008

So Microsoft’s widely publicized “edgy” ad campaign, the one designed to counter the Apple (AAPL) ads that have so eroded its brand, is to feature Jerry Seinfeld as celebrity pitchman. And in many ways that does more to illustrate the sad differences between the two companies than the “Mac vs. PC” ads it’s designed to combat. Because Microsoft (MSFT) has chosen as quarterback for this campaign a tired ’90s sitcom star who not only used a Mac in the series that made him famous, but closed out Apple’s 1997 “Crazy Ones” ad–which, ironically, aired only once, during the series finale of “Seinfeld.”

So Microsoft, in an effort to overhaul its image and upstage the cool kids down in Cupertino, seems to have done little but confirm the message of its rival’s ads: “I’m a Mac, You’re a Dork,” or, in this case, a dated comedian. Really, the company might as well have hired Don Rickles for the job. Certainly, he would have come cheaper than the $10 million Seinfeld is rumored to have demanded. And there’s life left yet in that “What are you lookin’ at, you hockey puck?!” line of his.

Anyway, in the end, it’s not marketing that’s the issue here. It’s the product.

The success of Windows is our number one job. With SP1 and the work we’ve done with PC manufacturers and our software ecosystem, we’ve addressed device and application compatibility issues in Windows Vista. Now it’s time to tell our story. In the weeks ahead, we’ll launch a campaign to address any lingering doubts our customers may have about Windows Vista. And later this year, you’ll see a more comprehensive effort to redefine the meaning and value of Windows for our customers.”

– Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, July 23, 2008

So Microsoft’s widely publicized “edgy” ad campaign, the one designed to counter the Apple (AAPL) ads that have so eroded its brand, is to feature Jerry Seinfeld as celebrity pitchman. And in many ways that does more to illustrate the sad differences between the two companies than the “Mac vs. PC” ads it’s designed to combat. Because Microsoft (MSFT) has chosen as quarterback for this campaign a tired ’90s sitcom star who not only used a Mac in the series that made him famous, but closed out Apple’s 1997 “Crazy Ones” ad–which, ironically, aired only once, during the series finale of “Seinfeld.”

So Microsoft, in an effort to overhaul its image and upstage the cool kids down in Cupertino, seems to have done little but confirm the message of its rival’s ads: “I’m a Mac, You’re a Dork,” or, in this case, a dated comedian. Really, the company might as well have hired Don Rickles for the job. Certainly, he would have come cheaper than the $10 million Seinfeld is rumored to have demanded. And there’s life left yet in that “What are you lookin’ at, you hockey puck?!” line of his.

Anyway, in the end, it’s not marketing that’s the issue here. It’s the product.