For many of us, the Super Bowl is really a secondary event. Over the years, it has taken a back seat to the commercials. Madison Avenue spends the entire year gearing up for the game saving its best efforts for the millions of eyeballs that actually don’t mind watching the ads.

While I enjoy the entertainment value of the Super Bowl commercials, there is a ton of investment value that can be gleaned by watching the advertisements. The four quarters of commercials provide a condensed glimpse into the world of consumers.

Finding Investible Idea’s

It is a capitalist potpourri that can be used to find investment opportunities. Let others judge which commercial was the most interesting or humorous. Instead, find the commercial that sheds light on where consumers are likely to gravitate in the future.

At a minimum I find at least one or two long-term investment opportunities that do very well over the long haul. What will this year’s Super Bowl yield?

To give you the idea of the power of the Super Bowl one only need to look at the release of news before the game started. NBC, the network airing the game, announced that it had indeed sold out all slots for the game for a record amount of $206 million.

This represents a more than 10% increase over last year’s amount of $186 million. Obviously the space is quite valuable for any company attempting to make a mark. Is it money well spent?

For the most part the answer is yes. The game was viewed by more than nearly 100 million viewers last year. That is an awful lot of eyeballs seeing your product.

That said, there is more to building a brand than having eyeballs see your ads. One need only go back a few years to remember the wasteful dollars spent promoting internet sites that had money to spend, but little else to offer, especially to investors.

Since the dot-com crash the ads for the Super Bowl tend to be from larger companies with deep balance sheets willing to invest in saturating their brand. Think beer companies, automakers and Hollywood.

No doubt this year’s commercial lineup had a full plate of offerings from deep pockets with Anheuser Busch leading the way. Along with the beer commercials we had a number of movies and autos including Chrysler and Audi participating in the day.

We also had commercials from those companies catering to job seekers. Monster, Careerbuilder and Ladders are three on-line job search companies that all promoted their sites during the game.

Noticeably absent though were the on-line education sites. One would have thought improving your resume would have resonated with the millions watching the game. Was it an opportunity lost or fiscal discipline?

For those that did buy space the tone of the commercials was a bit dull. Perhaps the weak economy had something to do with that. There was no 1984 moment (a reference to the iconic Apple launch of Macintosh computers during the 1984 Super Bowl).

There was really no wow moment or memorable ad that will be talked about for days at the water color. I suppose that is ok as long as the messages were able to strike a chord and ultimately trigger a buy moment somewhere down the road.

While there may have not been the earth shattering creative ad that grabbed everyone’s attention, what about the products? Was there anything being pitched worthy of investor attention and consideration?

And the winner is …

There was no real showcase product promoted during the game, but there was one company attempting to pitch a new strategy that looks to have huge investment potential for the long term.

That company was General Electric (GE). Its alternative energy focused ads were the winner of the advertising bowl for investors. They may not have been all that interesting or creative, actually they were, but they were telling for what I think will be GE’s future down the road.

Green stocks have been getting lost during this financial crisis. GE’s ads yesterday were an attempt to let people know that this big industrial concern is making green a focus. That focus has big potential in my opinion.

It is why I named the stock one of my Top 10 Stocks for 2009. Time will tell if this Super Bowl winner will be a stock winner as well.

I think GE will do quite well.

This article was written by Jamie Dlugosch, contributor to InvestorPlace.com. For more actionable insight like this, go to: www.InvestorPlace.com.