Integrated Marketing Strategies - Coca-Cola - Case Study Example

Integrated Marketing Strategies of the Table of Contents Introduction 3 Coca Cola’s IMC Communicating with Audience 3 Contact Tools of IMC 4 Contact Tools in Coca Cola’s IMC 5 Marketing Mix Elements in Coca Cola 6 Communication with Target Audience 7 IMC Tools in Coca Cola 8 Integration of Contact Tools 8 Assessment of IMC Program 9 Sources Used in Advertising Campaigns 10 Celebrity Spokesperson 10 Reputational Appeal Messages 10 Reasons of Advertisers Choice 10 Suitability of Spokesperson and Messages 10 Impact of Sources on Consumers 11 Conclusion 11 References 12 Introduction Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) is an implementation of reliable brand messaging across various marketing channels and various marketing methods in order to support each other. IMC is an approach to planning interactions that enables companies to generate better results from their campaigns and decrease marketing costs. By using numerous integrated tools like advertising, telemarketing and sales promotion, companies provide clarity, reliability and highest communications impact (Carpenter & Lehmann, 2010). The objective of the study is to explain with an example how companies can use different forms of IMCs in order to communicate with their target audience. Ample IMC contact tools will be examined for analyzing how they are used in IMC programs. The communication of marketing mix elements with the target audiences will be explained in detail. The contact tools that are widely used in the IMC of Coca Cola will be described and analysis will be done whether the tools sends a consistent message for the brand. Then, the overall assessment of the IMC program for the brand will be conducted. The types of message factors that are used by a few advertising companies will be analyzed through this study in order to conclude how these sources impact the customers to respond to the advertising campaign of the company. Coca Cola’s IMC Communicating with Audience IMC is classified into four types for interacting with their target audience such as external, internal, horizontal and vertical. External integration takes place when a company develops a product by keeping the lines of communication open for people (Quelch & Hoff, 2002). These channels will deliver its main message to the external world. Internal integration means if a company introduces a new product it will not want its workers to reveal features of it ahead of time. It will rather create excitement among their people regarding the product and that excitement gets transferred to people outside the company. Horizontal integration ensures that the line of communication remains open for the business to flow more smoothly. Finally, upright integration ensures that the product is united with the mission of the company for developing a flawless production plan (Carpenter & Lehmann, 2010). Coca Cola uses IMCs for efficiently communicating with its target audience. The company adapted this communication plan with regard to the market, society, potential and the product positioning (Shostack, 2005). Coca Cola desires to remain close to its consumers and wants to be a part of their everyday life in order to become a sort of ritual attached to their special moments. They use social media and marketing by means of social responsibility and try to create passion and feelings of affiliation toward their consumers. They even raise funds for community causes like earthquake and hurricane (Till & Nowak, 2000). The vital message they wish to deliver is focused on fun and entertainment. Their message is based on the target market and on some principles such as sharing, cheerfulness, fun and tradition of Coca Cola. Contact Tools of IMC There exist numerous IMC tools which are used by the companies simultaneously for promoting their products and services among target customers in an efficient way and ultimately generate higher revenues for the organization. Figure 1: IMC Target Interaction Tools Advertising is considered to be the most effective ways of promoting a brand. Advertisement can be done through broadcasting on television, radio and print medium such as newspapers, billboards. Advertisements enable companies to reach a large number of audiences in a very less time frame (Quelch & Hoff, 2002). These help to position the brand in the minds of the target consumers and motivate them to believe in the brand. These have the capability to increase consumption of the brands products and retain loyalty. Coca Cola advertises largely on television media and generally uses celebrity spokesperson for promoting their brand. Using celebrity spokesperson generated an increased liking for their brand and their customers kept on increasing. Sales promotion is another vital tool of IMC. A company can promote its products and services by giving away discount coupons, incentives, rewarding schemes, eye-catching packages for the loyal consumers, special deals and many more. Promotion of brands can also be done through newspaper pop ins, danglers, banners at appropriate locations, glorifiers and so on (Holm, 2006). Coca Cola promotes their brand through various sales promotion strategies such as offering people chances to meet celebrities through scratch codes if they purchase Coca Cola and they use many other rewarding schemes for attracting target consumers. Direct Marketing enables the company to directly communicate to its end users by means of internet through emailing and texting, giving out catalogues, promotional letters, etc. When Coca Cola introduces any new product to the market they implement the strategy of direct marketing. They directly communicate to their target customers by emailing them about offering special deals on purchasing the product. This strategy helps them to draw attention of millions of people worldwide. Public relations strategies encourages promoting a brand through press releases and public appearances (Kip, 2015). Here, the public relations officers represent the company at its best. Personal selling helps in strengthening the relationship among the customer and the company as the sales representatives sells the products to the clients by meeting them. Coca Cola promotes their brand through press releases and public appearances such as the public relations officer of the company represents the brand to the public in order to create a bond with their customers. Contact Tools in Coca Cola’s IMC Different contact tools are implemented in IMC as it is essential for the companies to communicate efficiently with their consumers The Company needs to know how their products will benefit their consumers. When the miscellaneous aspects of business and marketing are merged together properly, a successful campaign can be achieved. Successful campaigns are demonstrated on the brands display in supermarkets which identifies that the brands are inventive, strategic and successfully generating profits. (Ghauri & Masood, 2011). By leveraging each communication tool, larger impact can be gained together than achieving independently. IMC tools are used by Coca Cola to enable them to effectively promote their brand and increase the demand of their products in the market. Coca Cola realized that people will not invest in their product unless they find out something unique and interesting in the brands products. These tools make IMC more effective in communicating the uniqueness of their products. They enable the company to communicate their brand effectively to the target audience (Shostack, 2005). Marketing Mix Elements in Coca Cola Marketing mix can be understood as mixture of various ideas and plans implemented by the marketing representatives of a company in order to promote a product or brand. Various ideas and concepts needs to be combined for formulating ultimate strategies which will help a brand to become popular among people from marketing mix. There are various elements of the market mix widely known as 4 P’s for grabbing attention of the target audience (Ghauri & Masood, 2011). Coca Cola uses the marketing mix strategies for establishing their brand and increase its likeness among people. Product is one such element of the marketing mix. Goods that are manufactured by the companies for their consumers are known as products. Products can be physical such as foodstuffs or can be insubstantial such as services. A product is something that is supplied by the manufacturers to its users for the sake of earning revenue. Products are the main focus of Coca Cola. They develop their products and packaging on a regular basis in order to compete with other soda brands and satisfy their consumers. Price of the product is the money which is paid by the buyer for a company’s product. Price is determined by the availability of products in the market. The lesser the availability the more will be the products price. Coca Cola has a penetration pricing strategy and keeps its price less for increasing sales and retaining a large market share. Place means the location where the products of a company is bought and sold. Consumers can purchase their products either from physical or virtual market. In physical market, the buyers’ and sellers meet face to face and in virtual market the buyer and sellers interact by means of internet. Coca Cola supplies its products in every areas of the world possible. Their products are increasingly available even in the remote areas of the world. Promotion means the various strategies initiated by the marketers in order to make them aware of the brand. It comprises several techniques such as advertising for making a brand popular among masses (Munoz-Levia & Porsu, 2011). Coca Cola promotes its products through various advertising sources such as television media, web media and also print media like newspapers. Communication with Target Audience Coca Cola’s promotional strategy includes elements of the 4 P’s. The company changed their brand image by portraying themselves as socially responsible organization. Through their brand name, they created a picture of fun and entertainment in the peoples mind and became recognizable worldwide as an icon of enjoyment (Shostack, 2005). Coca Cola focused on packaging their soft drinks in an appealing manner. Its new beverage packaging is aimed at the diet coke range. It designed the bottle in such a way that it is refillable and it is styled aesthetically in order to appeal the sports or fitness concerned audiences. The packaging of their containers is done from sustainable supplied materials and manufacturing processes. They are constantly initiating packaging improvements for creating an impression that the company cares about the preferences of its customers (Venner, Madley & Braun, 2014). Penetration pricing strategy is used by Coca Cola to lead to a huge amount of sale and great market share. The strategy suggests setting lower price than higher price to attain dominant market share and attract a large number of consumers. It also encourages promoting their complementary products by keeping the price of the main product less (Quelch & Hoff, 2002). Coca Cola’s retail or distribution channels are much impressing as compared to their competitors category. It had a great impact on its consumers and due to its success a large number of retailers demanded the product for their business prosperity. They achieved objectives of high visibility on markets shelves and their diversified retail channels made the product available everywhere even in the remote areas of the world (Venner, Madley & Braun, 2014). IMC Tools in Coca Cola Selection of the IMC tool not only depends on the market and the items for consumption but also on the goals of the company. Coca Cola uses various elements of the IMC tools and ensures that they work together for delivering a reliable and influential message to the target consumers. Advertising is an important tool for Coca Cola for creating brand image and awareness worldwide as publicity through TV commercials, print media and bill boards cater a large number of consumers market throughout the world (Posavac, Sanbonmastu & Jain, 2012). Their slogans became universal and impressive all over the world and at the same time conveying their message to the target group. Direct marketing is another IMC tool through which Coca Cola focused on offering their soft drinks through partnerships like in restaurants and on campaigns including sponsorships. They also targeted audiences through campaigns such as emailing and texting (Munoz-Levia, & Porsu, 2011). Social media also played an important role in their IMCs. They communicated and grabbed attention of a large number of consumers by means of entertainment websites, social networking sites and advertisements on various social media. Coca Cola also uses public relations in its strategies through cultural events and corporate social responsibility (CSR) (Shostack, 2005). To distinguish themselves from the competitors, Coca Cola implemented various sales promotion strategies by placing their products in eye catching positions in the supermarkets, city markets and grocery stores. The company uses numerous strategies that are consumer and business oriented. Consumer focused strategies involved visibility in shelves and trade focused strategies included providing trade discount, merchandising and return back payments. Applying such tools, the brand succeeded in gaining competitive advantage (Shostack, 2005). Integration of Contact Tools The IMC tools were implemented by Coca Cola keeping in mind their objectives. These integrated tools were brilliantly successful in spreading their brand awareness message which resulted in increased demands of their products among the consumers. Primary objective was to retain and increase market share and its secondary objective was to provide a distinct personality to the brand. Though communication through advertising was criticized by some people, as they felt falling from a height shown in the advertisement generated a feeling of fear among them .Coca Cola realized such drawbacks and retained their positive image through CSR and public relations. Communicating through celebrity spokesperson and their posters increased brand appeal to a great extent. Consumers increased fondness for the company’s products proves that the communication channels of the company are effective. Their brand message gained increased popularity worldwide among target audiences and hence it can be gathered that IMC tools were applied powerfully by the company for successfully communicating with their consumers (Holm, 2006). Assessment of IMC Program Various criteria exist through which victory of a marketing campaign can be judged. Among them IMC assessment criteria is the most beneficial. It includes measuring customer loyalty, changes in market share and the amount of profit earned by implementing the IMC program. Similar analysis can be conducted in Coca cola for analyzing the effectiveness of its marketing campaign. From the criteria of consumer loyalty, the marketing initiatives of the brand can be considered to be increasingly flourishing. It has been observed that every second of everyday, millions of people pop open a Coca Cola beverage bottle and some of them consume it on a regular basis (T ill & Nowak, 2000). The efficiency of the brands IMC program can be evaluated through its market share criteria as well. Coca Cola is observed to sell its products across 200 countries and employing around 139,600 people and turned out to be a market leader (Holm, 2006). This result serves as an evidence of its growth and increasing market share. From the profitability point of view, the company’s IMC program efficiency can be judged. After implementation of the program, the Coca Cola generated 8.2 billion dollars from its operation during the year. Analysis of the media marketing campaigns that took place through internet can be done through a distinct set of assessment tools such as total number of unique visitors on website, results of free search engines and paid search engines. The results generated through these assessments confirm that Coca Cola positively contributed to achieving their vision (Venner, Madley & Braun, 2014). Sources Used in Advertising Campaigns Celebrity Spokesperson The advertising campaigns of the companies’ uses various sources for communicating their brands message to their target consumers for generating brand awareness and creating loyal customers. Coca Cola’s product, diet coke, generated a greater demand for their products through celebrity endorsements. A renowned athlete Michelle Kwan partnered with the advertising campaign of diet coke. He continued to represent the brand throughout the Olympics. It resulted in increased sales of the product as his fans generated a liking for the brand and preferred using it. Reputational Appeal Messages Reputational appeal messages of Coca Cola transformed it into the world’s preferred soda. The brand labeled itself “The great nationalized restraint Beverage” and stated that they provided people a suitable alternative to alcohol. Later they had a slogan “open happiness” to spread a feeling of enjoyment and togetherness (Venner, Madley & Braun, 2014). The advertising campaign of the brand generated profitable results and grabbed attention of a large number of target customer making the brand established successfully worldwide. Reasons of Advertisers Choice The choice of the spokesperson for promoting Coca Cola was appropriate as diet coke was invented for people who are concerned about their health. Choosing a renowned athlete in promoting the beverage was the best way to convey its message to the target audience. They would perceive that is an athlete is promoting the product it is supposed to be beneficial for the heath concerned people. The company by using reputational appeal messages wanted to ensure people that they have a concern for youth and they wish to build a strong reputation among people. Through these slogans it wished to create a liking for the brand among their consumers. This source worked well for Coca Cola and generated fruitful results for the company. Suitability of Spokesperson and Messages The advertiser of Coca Cola chose the celebrity spokesperson source for advertising with a belief that it would work well in gaining attention of a large number of people. Renowned celebrities tend to have a great fan following and so they are the best people who can gain attention of a large number of people if they promote a brand. The strategy worked and the Coca Cola was successful in increasing their popularity. The company used reputational appeal messages through slogans which were appropriate in delivering their messages to their customers. It also represented the vision of the company in a suitable manner. Their slogans turned out to be famous among masses and generated a sense of liking among people for the brand. Impact of Sources on Consumers Celebrity endorsement sources of Coca Cola generated a large attention of his fans and the sales volume hiked up. The consumers also perceived that if a celebrity is endorsing a brand it ought to be good. With this perception many health concerned preferred to use Coca Cola’s product rather than using other brands products. Due to the effective reputational messages they were being trusted, admired and their guidance was respected by masses. They delivered the message that they have vision of serving people at its best. In today’s icon driven market, implementing a winning marketing campaign is a vital approach in winning the cola battle with competitors (Kip, 2015). Conclusion IMC refers to be strategic marketing technique solely designed for ensuring that the communication approaches are unified across different channel and are focused on the customer. It is not only centered on winning new customers, but also on retaining old customers by an effective communication channel and maintain a sustainable healthy relationship with them. IMCs save much time which is often lost in finding out the suitable marketing tool. By conducting a critical evaluation of the Integrated Marketing Communication programs, it can be analyzed that a company or brand can benefit a lot by implementing these strategies. IMC programs consist of various contact tools for gaining efficiency in communicating with the target audiences. They help in creating brand loyalty and awareness among the target audiences and also contribute in gaining competitive advantage. Through the assessment of the Coca Colas IMC strategies and the sources used in their advertising campaigns, a conclusion can be drawn that these worked well for the brand and the company turned out to be a market leader. 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