Coca-Cola's Share a Coke Campaign: Communication & Sales
This paper examines the communication and sales effects of Coca-Cola's "Share a Coke" campaign, which replaced the iconic logo with consumers' first names to foster personal brand connections. The analysis covers the campaign's advertising objectives, multiplatform communication strategy, use of celebrity influencers, social media participation, and measurable sales outcomes. Drawing on promotional theory from Perreault, Cannon, and McCarthy, the paper argues that clearly defined objectives, audience-relevant content, and real-time consumer listening all contributed to the campaign's record-breaking 2011 summer performance among young adult consumers.
- Introduction: Promotion and the Competitive Soft Drink Market: Promotion theory and market context for campaign
- Advertising Objectives of the Share a Coke Campaign: Primary and secondary campaign goals defined
- Multiplatform Communication Strategy: Invitation-based strategy linking online and offline channels
- Media, Celebrity Influencers, and Social Sharing: Celebrity kits, Facebook tools, and national songs
- Sales Effects and Campaign Outcomes: Record summer sales and attitude shifts among youth
- Evaluating Communication and Sales Effects: Why measuring promotional effectiveness matters
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What makes this paper effective
- It grounds a real-world campaign analysis in promotional theory, linking concepts such as reminder advertising and promotional objectives directly to Coca-Cola's decisions.
- The paper moves logically from objective-setting through strategy execution to measurable outcomes, giving the analysis a clear cause-and-effect structure.
- Concrete campaign details — 150 personalized name bottles, celebrity seeding kits, Facebook sharing tools, live sign projections — anchor abstract marketing concepts in specific evidence.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates applied case analysis: it takes a textbook promotional framework (advertising objectives, medium selection, audience reach, feedback) and maps each element onto a documented real-world campaign. This technique shows how theoretical marketing constructs function in practice, making abstract principles tangible and testable against actual outcomes.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens by situating the campaign within competitive soft drink market pressures and promotional theory. It then identifies the primary and secondary advertising objectives before detailing the multiplatform strategy. Subsequent sections address medium selection, celebrity and social media amplification, and measurable sales results. The paper closes with a brief argument for why evaluating communication and sales effects matters to marketing managers. Each section builds on the previous, following a classic problem–strategy–outcome arc.
Introduction: Promotion and the Competitive Soft Drink Market
Coca-Cola wanted a campaign that would encourage consumers to connect with the brand on both online and offline platforms. The soft drink market had become intensely competitive, creating a need to establish a stronger brand connection with customers. The result was a highly successful advertising campaign known as "Share a Coke."
Promotion involves the communication of information between a seller and a potential buyer — or others in the channel — in order to influence their attitudes and behavior. For promotion to be effective, it requires clear and well-targeted communication; there are instances where a promotional message is never heard at all, or is simply not understood. Various promotional methods are available to marketers, including personal selling, mass selling (with advertising as its primary form), sales promotion, and publicity. A marketing manager must set clear priorities when it comes to promotional objectives, as these objectives are an important indicator that guides the selection of appropriate promotional tools (Perreault, Cannon, & McCarthy, 2010).
References
Perreault, W., Cannon, J., & McCarthy, E. (2010). Essentials of marketing (12th ed.). McGraw-Hill.
Marketing. (2012). Share a Coke campaign post-analysis. Retrieved October 2, 2014, from
Food Stuff South Africa. (2013). Coke's 'sharing' advertising campaign a worldwide success. Retrieved October 2, 2014, from
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