Bud Light: now with
the ability to breathe fire

The TV broadcast of Super Bowl XLII averaged a record 97 million viewers.

Among the big winners were Anheuser-Busch and Hyundai, according to comScore's 2008 Super Bowl post-game survey, reports MarketingCharts.

The survey of 1,139 US Internet users who watched Super Bowl XLII was conducted February 3-4.

The most popular advertiser during the Super Bowl was Anheuser-Busch, with its commercials for Bud and Bud Light (including comedian Will Ferrell's offbeat spot) scoring well among viewers, comScore found: Nearly half of those surveyed said they would like to see the commercials again.

Beverage spots were particularly popular , with a large percentage of respondents saying they would also like to see ads for Pepsi (28 percent) and Coca Cola (25 percent) again.

Hyundai does most to help its brand, SalesGenie.com the least

Respondents were asked whether the Super Bowl ads they saw improved or hurt their impression of the brands being advertised, and each of this year's advertisers registered some brand improvement:

• Hyundai's advertisement for the Genesis had the most positive impact on its brand, with 46 percent of respondents indicating that it helped the brand, while just 1 percent said it damaged the brand, giving it a net improvement score of 45 percent.
• Anheuser-Busch once again got an overwhelmingly positive response, while Bridgestone earned the third-highest net improvement score with its humorous ad featuring Richard Simmons.
• Meanwhile, SalesGenie.com had the highest "brand damage" score, but still managed a small net improvement score.
• Perennially controversial Super Bowl advertiser GoDaddy.com also drew a high negative response with its racy ad featuring race car driver Danica Patrick.

Super Bowl-Related Internet Use

Among comscore's findings:

• Some 11 percent of respondents said they used the internet to monitor stats and stories related to the game, and 3 percent said they went online to place bets on the game.
• 13 percent said they watched a Super Bowl ad online after the game.
• 13 percent also said that they visited an advertiser website after the Super Bowl.
• Of those who visited an advertiser's website, 38 percent said they visited GoDaddy.com, while 22 percent visited Coca Cola's site and 21 percent visited Pepsi's site.

According to multichannel marketing company SendTec, GoDaddy.com achieved the highest score of online integrated with offline advertising during the 2008 Super Bowl:

• GoDaddy reported seeing an influx in web traffic as soon your commercial aired.
• The website had half-million visitors in the first 30-minutes
• While 2 million visitors came to godaddy.com, 178,000 (9.17 percent) were from search engines. During the previous two Sundays, search engines drove 7.8-7.25 percent.

SendTec said 64 percent of Super Bowl advertisers included a website URL in their ad; however, just 12 percent of the ads actually called out the website in the voiceover.