The Emory Sports Marketing Team analyzed all ads released before the Super Bowl in 2013 and followed their Twitter mentions more than a month after the Super Bowl.

“What we found is that if you preview the ad, you get the biggest increase before the Super Bowl,” Tripathi says. “But if you look at the longer-term effect a month after the Super Bowl, pre-releasing or previewing has no effect, whereas putting the whole ad out there tends to have more of a permanent increase.”

Many companies still wait for the Super Bowl unveiling of their new ad, but Tripathi expects we’ll see a steady increase in online releases in the years instead of waiting for the big game.