Coca Cola is going back to basics. Following the launch of its latest branding strategy in Paris earlier this year, its soon going to go global with its One Brand strategy - a strategy that clubs all of its different brands - such as Diet Coke and Coke Zero - into one single positioning.
Sources in marketing and advertising industry say that while Coca Cola is second most recognisable word across the world after the word okay, its open happiness campaign rolled out in 2009 wasn't really working for it.
"The firm's growth had remained sticky in the developed part of the world for some time, in part because of the brand dilution it suffered under the open happiness campaign," said one source at a Karachi-based advertising firm.
"The open happiness campaign was a tad too philosophical, very hopey-changey, and rather remote from the product itself. The new campaign, however, puts that unique Coke taste at the very heart of its campaign, says another source. The new campaign is tag-lined "Taste the Feeling". Earlier, this year, Marcos de Quinto, Coca Cola's Chief Marketing Officer, was reported saying that "More than ever, we recognize people want their Coca-Cola in different ways, but whichever one they want, they want a Coca-Cola brand with great taste and uplifting refreshment. Through the One Brand strategy we will move away from multiple brand campaigns, to one single iconic brand campaign that celebrates both the product and the brand."
"The new One Brand approach will share the equity of Coca-Cola, across all Coca-Cola Trademark products, reinforcing our commitment to offer consumers choice with more clarity. This is a powerful investment behind all Coca-Cola products, showing how everyone can enjoy the specialness of an ice-cold Coca-Cola, with or without calories, with or without caffeine," he added.
The launch of the "One Brand" strategy is an important part of Coca Cola's growth strategy, and the firm expects more impact per dollar invested in marketing campaign, as a result of uniting Coca-Cola variants under one, iconic brand positioning in one global marketing campaign.
In recent years, the soft drink industry has invited some criticism from health conscious customers across the developed world. This pushed global soft drink players to develop and market products that have zero or low sugar content. Coca Cola did the same, albeit under different brand campaigns - a move which will now be reversed following the launch of One Brand strategy in the ensuing months.
The act of combining multiple brands also makes good business sense since outside the developed world, Coca Cola's other low or no-sugar brands contribute relatively small percentage to its revenue pie, whereas the real revenue growth of the soft drink giant is seen coming from developing and emerging economies where customers are not very health conscious as yet.
The firm has already engaged the world's leading advertising firms, photographers, story tellers, singer-songwriters etcetera to develop its newest campaign. Pretty soon Pakistanis will also see a host of new advertisements across digital, print and electronic media under Coke's latest tagline "Taste the Feeling". The interesting bit will be how will Coca Cola localise or translate its Taste the Feeling in Urdu language. That exercise alone may well put translators in a pickle.
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