The last time Coca-Cola invited the world to buy itself a drink, the gesture came wrapped in a single, memorable campaign. That was a long time ago.
These days, the beverage giant is running what amounts to three distinct marketing operations simultaneously — one for the World Cup, one for the 250th anniversary of the United States, and one to remind Americans that a hamburger tastes better with a Coke alongside it. Each campaign operates from its own media playbook, which is another way of saying that the era of matching luggage, as one strategist put it, has been packed away.
The timing is not incidental. Later this year, WPP and Publicis Groupe will square off in what promises to be one of the more consequential agency reviews of the season, each trying to persuade Coca-Cola's leadership that its data infrastructure is best suited to crew this particular machine. For WPP, the incumbent, a loss would be an early and unwelcome verdict on the tenure of its recently appointed chief executive, Cindy Rose. For Publicis, a win would be precisely the opposite.
In the meantime, the campaigns themselves offer a useful preview of what Coca-Cola expects its agency partners to deliver. According to data seen by Digiday, the company spent an estimated $105.2 million in the United States during the first quarter, with video, connected television and social media each accounting for roughly $30 million. Linear television, once the default, received $17.2 million — a share that would have seemed unthinkable not so long ago.
The "And A Coke" campaign, designed to boost sales at fast-food restaurants, deployed nearly double the mobile budget of its patriotic counterpart, a tilt toward consumers already in motion and closer to the cash register. Bennie Reed, a strategist who formerly worked on Dr Pepper, called it a "brick to forehead" approach. (Sometimes the forehead is exactly where you want the brick.)
On social media, Coca-Cola's World Cup efforts have generated a 43 percent share of all sponsor engagement, according to Meltwater — 75 percent above the category average. A single post announcing a partnership with the Spanish soccer prodigy Lamine Yamal produced 40 million impressions.
The common thread, according to one analyst, is a focus on high-reach moments designed to attract younger and infrequent buyers rather than reward the already faithful. Whether that strategy survives the agency review intact remains, for now, an open question.
Original story published in Digiday: "Under the hood of Coca-Cola’s spring and summer campaign blitz", by Sam Bradley