Advertisers during Super Bowl XLIII reached the largest audience of any Super Bowl game — the second most-viewed television event of all-time, according to Nielsen.  Ads for Bud Light Lime and GoDaddy.com were seen by 103.2 million viewers last Sunday.
According to Nielsen’s annual report on Super Bowl advertising and overall viewing, an average of 98.7 million U.S. viewers tuned in to the game.  Almost 152 million people watched the last six minutes of the game, giving it the largest reach by a TV event ever.
Other key findings include:

Total commercial airtime …

With all the anticipation surrounding Sunday’s big game, an analysis of national and local ratings from past Super Bowls provides insight into the viewership of this year’s matchup:

In terms of DMA’s (Designated Market Area), Phoenix is ranked 12th and Pittsburgh 23rd of the 56 metered markets. The 2006 Super Bowl featured a similar match-up with Seattle, ranked the 13th largest DMA, against Pittsburgh, then 22nd. That game received a 57.4 rating in Pittsburgh and 54.4 in Seattle (compared to 41.6 nationally).

From 1999-2008, the highest single-year metered market performance was delivered in Jacksonville …

Given the current, sluggish economic climate, retailers will have to look hard to find growth opportunities in the U.S.
According to Nielsen Claritas, they might start by taking a closer look at large, fast-growing metro areas, like Atlanta, Dallas, and Phoenix. 
These three markets ranked as the top three fastest growing U.S. markets in the last eight years — and could offer the retail industry some hard-to-come-by expansion opportunities, Nielsen reported in a new study released Monday.
“While some of these markets like Phoenix and Los Angeles have been hard hit by the recent wave …