Animal Planet, a division of Silver Spring’s Discovery Communications Inc., scored its biggest ratings coup yet for its annual Puppy Bowl with 9.2 million viewers across the 12-hour marathon program.
Puppy Bowl VII is Animal Planet’s version of the Super Bowl and aired on the same day as the Big Game. The “game” takes place in Animal Planet Stadium’s custom football field and features an array of puppies, including everything from spaniels to baby bassets to mixed breeds as they do their best immitations of Aaron Rodgers and Greg Jennings. (We’re assuming they weren’t trying to imitate anyone on the losing side of Sunday’s matchup.)
Animal Planet’s extra effort in social media marketing this year also payed off big as three Puppy Bowl topics made it into Twitter’s top trending topics with #puppybowl second only to #SuperBowl — a paid media placement.
“Overall, the trending topic terms — Puppy Bowl and #puppybowl — combined for more than 16,000 mentions that reached an estimated 12 million Twitter users,” Animal Planet said in a release, adding that the Puppy Bowl’s Facebook fan page doubled its fan count in the week leading up to the broadcast.
By the way, the Super Bowl didn’t do so bad itself — 111 million viewers, a ratings record, is nothing to sneeze at.
All of the animals featured in the Puppy Bowl are adoptable and came from 30 rescue and shelter groups representing 18 states and U.S. territories.
