Coke Marketing Promotion Analysis - Essay Example

? Coke Promotion- Report inserts his/her s Department’s With growingawareness of the benefits of non-carbonated, healthy beverages, the carbonated market sector has been gradually declining in various parts of the world. Despite this trend, however, Coke has managed to maintain its strong market presence through heavy investments in its diverse promotional strategies. This report describes these strategies by exploring the promotional tactics used by Coke in various markets across the world and the way in which these are effective in reaching the product’s target audience. Contents Contents 3 1. Introduction 4 1. Introduction Coca Cola boosts of having the highest brand equity in the world. According to surveys, one of the most recognized words in the world is “Coca Cola”. The product Coca Cola continues to dominate the carbonated drinks market despite sturdy headwinds and is well ahead of its competitor Pepsi. Considering a slow but steady move towards non-carbonated healthy drinks, the product has faced mounting pressure to boost and enhance its promotional activity across the globe in order to maintain market share which has seen a decline from 2005-2010 (Euromonitor International, 2011). This report shall investigate and describe the promotional mix and strategies that have enabled the Coca Cola brand to uplift and maintain the leadership of its carbonated Coke beverage across the globe. 2. Promotional mix From partnerships with renowned international brands to using celebrities in advertisements to keep the youth hooked, Coke has effectively been promoted through all promotional media. In 2006, for instance, Coca Cola distributed approximately 70 million codes of songs inside Coke’s packs which were redeemable at Apple’s i-tunes store (Telecomworldwire, 2006). Users of Coke were also entitled to giveaways of 1,500 i-pods in Germany the same year (Telecomworldwire, 2006). Along the same lines, a massive CD giveaway was held in Atlanta whereby $1 coupons for cassettes were placed inside Coke bottles (Marketing News, 1991). In another campaign, the company exploited the 20-30 year old target market for Coke by entitling them to win diamonds worth a million dollars through giveaway in Hong Kong (Hargrave-Silk, 2004). The diamonds had three shapes namely round, marquise and princess each of which corresponded to personalities attached to Vanilla Coke, Lemon Coke and Coke Light respectively (Hargrave-Silk, 2004). This was one of the most expensive promotional campaigns of its times beating its rival products such as Pepsi. This strategy also reflects how Coke’s lifestyle-oriented promotions aim at aspiring young, exuberant, contemporary men and women. The attributes of the Coke drink are reflected in its advertisements. For instance, one of the ads depicted a confident, bold and sexually appealing customer at a restaurant where Coke was sponsoring a giveaway (Hargrave-Silk, 2004). As mentioned earlier, Coca Cola has effectively used psychological marketing in its promotional mix. The company has also partnered with Parts Connection (a motor trade dealer) whereby a can of Coke is given with every purchase worth $100. The can is worth $1,000 of petrol (Motor Equipment News, 2009). At the end of a particular period, the labelled cans can be used for drinking Coke (Motor Equipment News, 2009). This has given cash starved customers another reason to purchase spare parts from this dealer. The product has such a huge fan following that some of the company’s promotional efforts have fallen short of its customers’ expectations. As part of its regular line of promotion, the Coke brand has been running an online loyalty program for its Coke fans which has become a source of disappointment for its loyal fans. These fans claim to have collected several codes from bottle caps in return for points only to discover that few of the expensive products (against which the points are redeemable) have run out of stock (Clifford, 2008). Therefore, despite several successful campaigns, the company does face challenges in terms of promoting Coke to millions of loyal fans worldwide. Even though prizes, giveaways and sponsorships have been an integral part of Coke’s promotional strategy, its promotional activity through advertisements cannot be ignored. Most of the ads used by Coke have triggered an instant desire for the drink amongst the youth. Playing with the psyche of anxious and upbeat teenagers, a sense of urgency has been created among Coke fans to consume the drink. In most countries, famous celebrities including film stars have been used as brand ambassadors for Coke. These endorsements have created a strong bondage between the product and its users as users can associate themselves to the endorsers. In most of its ads, Coke has made effective use of music and catchy jingles to promote the product to its target market. For instance, the brand has used Harry Nilsson’s popular song “Coconut” in one of its ads and altered the wordings to include the word ‘Coke’ (Kurtz & Boone, 2009). Most importantly, the product has been heavily advertised world over during the breaks between cricket matches and other sports. For instance, the Coke beverage sponsored The Olympics in 1996 for an amount of $40 million (Rice, 1996). More money was spent on advertisements, sales promotions and the construction of Olympics pavilion by Coke. In general, Coke’s ads are uniquely placed between world cups, major tournaments and Olympics in order to create a desire to quench the thirst of audience that is high on adrenaline. Therefore, the company cleverly makes use of the audience’s subconscious desires and ties it to events that are likely to boost sale of its Coke beverage. In another instance, push strategy has been successfully used by Coke to entice retailers to stock its product. As part of summer promotion, the company offered millions of dollars worth discount to its bottlers (Wall Street Journal, 1997). Furthermore, its global partnership with Mc Donald’s has given Coke an edge over its competitors. The “Coke and fries” promotion has utilized colors and personality traits in the up gradation of the design of the Coke cup (Shaw, 2003). Research indicates the collaboration of Coke to promote “branded entertainment” of various reality shows and other entertainment shows (Hudson & Hudson, 2006). In essence, this form of promotion is product placement in disguise. For instance, the popular show American idol featured the placement of Coke cans in its shows which was a subtle demonstration of the product’s usage (Kurtz & Boone, 2009). In another research that explores the concept of “advertainment” Coke’s massive partnership with Harry Potter’s movies involved the manufacturing of children’s spectacles to the “junk beverages” (Kretchmer, 2004). Hence, using product placement in movies and television shows has evolved as a highly profitable means of promotion. In all these cases, although there was no obvious focus on the product, it produced the effect of being subconsciously absorbed by the viewers while watching the show/film. Therefore, subliminal marketing strategy has been successfully deployed by Coke here. The use of subliminal and neuromarketing strategies in Coke’s promotion are not new. In the “Pepsi Challenge” that was performed decades ago, Coke came out as the winner in tests where participants were told which brand they were about to taste (Shimp, 2010). This indicated that Coke has maintained its attractive image through effective promotion throughout the years so much so that past experiences and associations with Coke’s promotions led them to prefer Coke over Pepsi. Ads containing slogans showing Coke as “the real thing” and consumers “buying a world of coke” have resulted in positive resonance with most of its customers (Shimp, 2010). The Coke brand has been promoted as being associated with happiness which means consumers who buy Coke, in fact, buy happiness. 3. Conclusion By using well-crafted and a diverse mix of promotional strategies, the Coke brand has established a positive connection with consumer’s feelings, attitudes, behavior and lifestyle to come out as the most popular carbonated drink in the world. The product’s promotion has evolved from advertisements containing attractive, catchy slogans to sophisticated methods such as neuromarketing and subliminal product placements making giving it an unrivalled top position in the carbonated drinks market. References Clifford, S., 2008. Is a Coke Promotion Betraying Its Loyalists?. New York Times, 1 September. p.5. Euromonitor International, 2011. The Coca-Cola Company in Soft Drinks (World). Research. London: WARC Euromonitor International. Hargrave-Silk, A., 2004. Coke partners DTC to give away diamonds. Media: Asia's Media & Marketing Newspaper, 23 April. pp.5-5. Hudson, S. & Hudson, D., 2006. Branded Entertainment: A New Advertising Technique or Product Placement in Disguise? Journal of Marketing Management, 22(5-6), pp.489-504. Kretchmer, S.B., 2004. The Evolution of Product Placement as a Mass Media Marketing Strategy. Journal of Promotion Management, 10(1-2), pp.37-54. Kurtz, D.L. & Boone, L.E., 2009. Contemporary Business. 12th ed. Mason: South-Western Cengage Learning. Marketing News, 1991. Coke targets youth market with CD, tape promotion. Marketing News, 29 April. pp.5-5. Motor Equipment News, 2009. Tenth anniversary for Parts Connection Coke promotion. Motor Equipment News, September. pp.8-8. Rice, M., 1996. Coca-Cola to Sponsor Olympic Games Through 2008. [Document] Associated Press Available at: HYPERLINK "http://www.apnewsarchive.com/1996/Coca-Cola-to-Sponsor-Olympic-Games-Through-2008/id-12b487f171395fa28935a6e82c1b9d06" http://www.apnewsarchive.com/1996/Coca-Cola-to-Sponsor-Olympic-Games-Through-2008/id-12b487f171395fa28935a6e82c1b9d06 [Accessed 4 April 2013]. Shaw, S.D., 2003. McDonald's and Coke take cup promotion nationwide. Media: Asia's Media & Marketing Newspaper, 22 August. pp.5-5. Shimp, T.A., 2010. Advertising, Promotion, and Other Aspects of Integrated Marketing Communications. 8th ed. Mason : South-Western Cengage Learning. Telecomworldwire, 2006. Apple's iTunes to give away 70m songs through Coke promotion. Telecomworldwire, 2 August. Wall Street Journal, 1997. Coke promotion. Wall Street Journal - Eastern Edition, 229(104), pp.B8-B8. Read More