Super Bowl ad review: OpenAI's $16M brand spot vs. Ramp's direct-response win with Saquon Barkley
Feb 10, 2025
Key Points
- OpenAI spent $16 million on a brand-building Super Bowl ad with no product demo or call-to-action, a misaligned strategy given its mid-fundraise and competition from Perplexity in search.
- Ramp's direct-response spot starring Saquon Barkley showed immediate product value to finance leaders, proving clarity and product-market fit outperformed vibe on the Super Bowl's crowded timeline.
- OpenAI positioned itself as the next Apple with long-term brand infrastructure, but Ramp's bet on conversion effectiveness demonstrated that tactical clarity wins in the moment.
Summary
OpenAI's $16M Super Bowl brand play vs. Ramp's direct-response win with Saquon Barkley
OpenAI spent $16 million on a 60-second Super Bowl ad that was pure brand building—pixelated visuals, symbolic imagery of humanity's progress, no product demo, no call-to-action. The hosts found it aesthetically impressive and well-produced, but strategically misaligned with OpenAI's actual moment. The company is mid-fundraise ($40 billion at a potential $350 billion valuation) and facing active competition from Perplexity in search. Spending that much on inspiration rather than user acquisition felt like a missed opportunity to show consumers what ChatGPT actually does—answer sports questions, explain rules, help with research during live events. Instead, OpenAI essentially ran the kind of visionary ad Apple would make.
Ramp took the opposite approach. CEO Eric Glyman ran a tight, narrative-focused spot starring NFL running back Saquon Barkley chasing down expense reports, tying the product directly to his Super Bowl victory. The hook: finance teams across America worked the weekend closing January books. Ramp showed immediate product value—faster expense management—to a hyper-targeted audience (CFOs and finance operators, of whom the hosts estimate 90% watch the Super Bowl). The ad drove engagement, reinforced Ramp's position as a real company playing in the big leagues, and made direct-response sense. If you're a finance leader watching, you understand exactly what Ramp does and why you might need it.
The tension is instructive. OpenAI positioned itself as the next Apple—a creative, inspiring consumer brand filling a void left by Apple's increasingly generic marketing. That positioning may be correct long-term and defensible as brand infrastructure for a $350 billion company. But Ramp's bet—that clarity and product-market fit matter more than vibe—proved more immediately effective on the Super Bowl's cluttered timeline. The hosts note that Perplexity, watching OpenAI take an aspirational swing, would have been tempted to run a search-focused ad themselves, turning the game into direct competition for answer engines at the exact moment millions of people had questions.