Social Media Marketing Tool Used by Coca Cola - Case Study Example

Advertising/marketing using Social Media Introduction The essay is focused on exploring the influence of social media strategies on the marketing and advertisement procedure of The Coca-Cola Company. The organisation is one of the leading international marketers of soft drinks and beverage. The organisation was incorporated in 1886 and it is presently headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. The exceptional marketing tactics of businessman Asa Griggs Candler assisted the organisation to introduce the brand in the global platform (Marketline, 2014). The study will discuss different social media tools utilized by The Coca-Cola Company to promote and advertise their brand across the globe. The discussion will also highlight different advertisement methods and marketing campaigns used by the organisation. Therefore, it will illustrate various risk factors and their solutions in terms of using social media in their marketing and advertising strategy. Social media marketing tool used by Coca Cola Coca-Cola Company utilizes different social media sites to communicate with their potential consumers such as Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+ as the marketing tools for their brand (The Coca-Cola Company, 2015). Coca-Cola on Facebook The organisation has their biggest fan base on the Facebook. The recent record has shown that over 82 million consumers have liked their social media page on the facebook. The social media strategy of the organisation is focused on generating awareness about their ad campaigns and maintaining their brand reputation (Shively, 2014). The organisation has various Facebook applications such as “When will happiness strike” and “Ahh Giver” (Shively, 2014). Diet Coke advertisement through Facebook Coca-Cola on Twitter The organisation has separate Twitter feeds for all their operational market markets. These Twitter feeds have different pages for all of their brand products. Their major Twitter feed has almost 700,000 followers. They have recorded 1,322,000 tweets in the last quarter. The management mainly utilize their twitter page to promote their brand and answer the queries of their consumers (Furrier, 2013). Tweet feeds of Coca-Cola to promote their brand Coca-Cola on Pinterest The Pinterest account of Coca-Cola is not very well-established like their Facebook and Twitter pages. This social media page has only 2,791 followers. They also have a Pinterest account for the Diet Coke brand. This page has 3,400 followers (Giordano, 2013). Pinterest page of Coca-Cola Coca-Cola on Google+ The organisation uses similar strategy for their Facebook page and Google+. They utilize Google+ to post contain that attracts the interest of their potential customers. They also use the video chatting facility of Google hangout to communicate with their consumers (Moth, 2013). Promoting ad campaigns through Google+ Advertisement methods used by Coca Cola The management of Coca-Cola Company uses a variety of advertisement methods to promote their products worldwide. The organisation spends huge amount to advertise their products through billboards, newspapers, magazines, television, internet and social media (Fayerweather, 2013). They also sponsor various social and cultural programs across the world. Coca-Cola follows institutional advertising method by sponsoring different multinational events. Sponsoring big events not only enables them to advertise their products, it also assists them to strengthen the brand reputation and brand name on consumer’s mind (Fayerweather, 2013). The organisation is known for displaying creative commercial through television and other commercial channels. Through their advertisements in television the organisation mainly focuses on promoting their product ranges throughout their global consumers. They generally customize the language of TV commercials as per the advertising regions (Adbrand.net, 2015). Celebrity endorsement is an effective advertisement strategy for the organisation. The management associates different celebrities, such as Penelope Cruz, Michelle Kwan, Courtney Cox and Wayne Rooney, with their brand image to attract more consumers. Advertising through attractive and innovative billboards and hoardings can also be considered as one of their major marketing strategies. Their outdoor ad varies from wall paintings to digital advertisement on popular skyscrapers. The promotional method of Coca-Cola through print media, such as newspaper and magazine, also focuses on the institutional advertisement method. The following advertisement in Advertising Age magazine is not only intended to attract customers to buy their product, it is also emphasises on the 125 years of brand reputation of the organisation. Print media advertising of Coca-Cola The management of Coca-Cola Company uses the multiple hubs and spoke model to promote their brands through social media. This multiple hub and spoke model enables the different business units of the organisation to act autonomously under a common brand name. Procedure of conducting campaigns of Coca Cola The Coca-Cola Company mainly focuses on the taste and preferences of different sections of the market to design their advertisement campaign. It assists them to analyse the demand of the potential customers of different market segments. Therefore, it enables the organisation to choose right media to advertise their promotional campaigns (Dudovskiy, 2015). Customer’s age, lifestyle and media habits play an important role in the promotional activities of the organisation. Though the brand has no specific target in terms age of the consumers, they generally design their advertisement campaigns focusing on the consumers aged between 12 to 30 years (Goswami et al. 2013). Busy and tech savvy youth are the main target of the organisation. Analyzing the media habit of consumers also plays an important role on the decision making regarding the marketing campaigns of the organisation. The young audience targeted by the brand generally prefers the media exposure. Different social media and mobile application has become the part of the daily life of the youth (Johnson and Weinstein, 2004). Analysing social behaviour of consumers also assist the organisation to design their marketing campaigns. After analysing the market preferences the organisation focuses on choosing the right communication procedure for their selected market segments. The commercial campaigns of Coca-Cola are mainly designed to attract the students and family oriented consumers. The organisation focuses on displaying their commercial through TV as well as online social media (Coca-Cola, 2014). The organisation conducts different marketing campaigns during holiday season of different countries and regions. Most of these marketing campaigns include holiday season greetings to the consumers. The organisation also focuses on creating clear and consistent contents for their marketing campaigns. Simple yet powerful slogans help the management of Coca-Cola to create a strong effect on the consumer’s mind. The management also make sure that all the campaigns of the organisation are designed for the similar goal i.e. attracting more customers towards the brand. Risks of using social media in this way Social media advertising and incorporating different social networking sites in the advertisement procedure influences the competitive market position of the organisation. On the other hand, application of social media for the marketing campaign can create various issues for MNCs (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010). Public relation crisis is one of the major risks that may occur to the organisation due to their social media marketing campaigns. False information distribution through different social media sites can harm the reputation of any business. The negative information about the organisation can go viral beyond control due to the vast network of these social media sites (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010). Inadequate knowledge about different operations of various social media sites can also generate the risks of failure in the marketing campaigns (Assaad and Gómez, 2011). As per example it can be said that the insufficient knowledge of Coca-Cola in terms of the operations of Pinterest has decreases their overall performance in this social media site (Ratcliff, 2014). On the other hand their immediate competitor Pepsi Co. Has demonstrated a successful marketing campaign on the same social media site (Ratcliff, 2014). The Coca-Cola Company generally introduce different commercial advertisements as per the cultural diversity of various countries and regions. Every social media advertisement can be viewed by all the customers across the globe. Various online advertisements can offend consumers from different cultural background (Assaad and Gómez, 2011). Therefore, it can harm the reputation of the organisation in the global platform. Procedure to improve the use of social media for advertising/marketing In order to eliminate all the risks of incorporating social media in the marketing campaign of the organisation, the management of Coca-Cola Company need to improve their processes of using the social media in different advertisement procedures. To avoid issues related to public relations, the organisation must create strict security parameter for their social media usage. Before publishing any content in the social media site the management need to recheck all the details. The department handling the social media communication need to be trained properly to efficiently handle all the complaints and queries of the consumers. They must design their online commercials meticulously so that it does not hurt the feelings of any consumer section. Analysing the audiences of different social media site is essential before posting any advertisements to those sites. The organisation needs to categorize their marketing campaigns as per the audiences of different social media sites. The organisation needs to understand all the functionality of different social media sites to ensure the success of their marketing campaigns. They need to use social media monitoring tools, such as Argyle, to keep the track of different activities over these sites. This will also assist them to pin down the potential consumers and the exact procedure to reach them. Conclusion The study has described the performance of The Coca-Cola Company through various social media sites such as Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter and Google+. The study has also revealed their traditional as well as social media marketing and advertising strategies. The study has emphasised on the potential risks of using these social media sites for business promotions such as public relation issues, security breach, and inadequate knowledge of proper functioning of those sites. Considering these facts, suggestions pertaining to various issues of social media in the promotional activities of the organisation have been provided. Reference List Adbrand.net, 2015. Selected Coca-Cola Company drinks advertising. [online] Available at [Accessed 28 February 2015]. Assaad, W. and Gómez, J. M., 2011. Social Network in marketing (Social Media Marketing)-Opportunities and Risks. network, 2(1), pp. 114-118. Coca-Cola. 2014. Coca-Cola Rumours and Facts. [Online]. 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