The most recognized word in the world is ‘OK’. The second most recognized word is ‘Coca-Cola’. The Coca-Cola company is HUGE - selling almost 2 billion drinks per day.
That means on average, every one of you drinks at least one Coca-Cola product every four days. If you are American, it’s every day. How did Coca-Cola become so big?
There are several reasons, including cocaine and Father Christmas. But their secret ingredient might be their marketing. Coca-Cola is one of the biggest brands in the world.
And at the heart of their strategy is: sports. But unlike Nike or Red Bull, Coca-Cola does not sponsor athletes. They chose to go for a different strategy - that is not less successful.
And after many videos about the swoosh and the Bull, we decided it is time to break down the sports marketing strategy of Coca-Cola. This video was made possible by Blinkist. Welcome to Athletic Interest and how the Olympics and FIFA made Coca-Cola bubble in popularity.
The greatest brands all have one thing in common. They do not simply sell a product, they are selling a story. A lifestyle.
Apple rarely talks about battery life or bits. They want you to ‘think different’, be creative and change the world for the better using their tools. Nike never talks about their shoes and how their air soles are better than those from Adidas.
They honor great athletes and great athletics. That’s who they are and what they’re about. And it’s why you probably think about sports when you see the Nike or Red Bull logo.
Both have built performance-driven sports brands by sponsoring elite athletes. If this strategy is so successful, why is Coca-Cola not doing the same and sponsoring high-performance athletes? Because it would not be authentic.
Although the original recipe had cocaine in it, the drink is no longer about performance enhancement. But that doesn’t stop them from doing sports marketing. Sports and Coca-Cola may not seem like a natural fit, but the fizzy drink has been pouring itself all over sports from the very beginning.
Coca-Cola sponsored its first Olympic Games in 1928 and has gone on to become the event’s longest-running partner. In 76, Coca-Cola became one of the first global partners of FIFA, helping to fund initiatives that developed football across the globe. They have sponsored every World Cup since then.
While Coca-Cola does have some long-standing partnerships with national teams and club sides, the company’s focus seems to be on large events. Instead of single superstar athletes. To be fair, we completely understand why Coca-Cola is avoiding athlete sponsorship… So, what’s so attractive about sponsoring the Olympics or the World Cup?
Coca-Cola’s own justification is very telling: This here is the key point. Coca-Cola wants to celebrate the key sporting moments with you. Usain Bolt wins the 100 metres.
Coca-Cola is there. Ronaldo scores the penalty. Coca-Cola is there.
Brazil lift the World Cup. Coca-Cola is there. Moments of celebration are for Coca-Cola what elite athletes are for Nike.
“Life tastes good, open happiness, Taste the feeling”, Coca Cola’s marketing has always been about selling that lifestyle. And what better way than by plastering its logo all over the stadiums, and filling the television breaks with inspirational commercials? That way their logo is never far from the greatest sporting moments of our time, and the eyes of the 3 billion people watching.
If you always see the Coca-Cola logo and commercials during the deciding moments of the World Cup and Olympics, you start to associate Coke with that feeling of celebration. It’s essentially conditioning. Before the 2010 World Cup, Coca-Cola took this method to a whole new level.
They realized that fans were particularly interested in seeing what new celebrations the players would show at the World Cup, so they created an advert celebrating the history of goal celebrations. Now every time someone celebrated the viewers would be reminded of Coca-Cola. This created a direct emotional link between big moments in the World Cup and Coca-Cola’s brand.
This is the simplest form of lifestyle marketing, something that every brand sponsoring the World Cup or Olympics is engaging with on some level. But Coca-Cola’s marketing goes even deeper. Recent studies have confirmed that taste has the power to bring back certain memories and emotions from previous times you consumed the same food or drink.
This is particularly true for sweet stuff. Consuming sugar while experiencing a certain emotion will make it easier for your brain to remember that emotion - ready to be triggered again when you consume the same thing in the future. This is a dream for Coca-Cola.
If they can get us to drink a Coke while watching the World Cup, our brains instantly link those memories and feelings of connection, happiness and magic to the sugary taste of Coca-Cola. With a simple sip and a 30-second advert, Coca-Cola has gone from being a deeply unhealthy drink to a portal to some of the most exciting moments of our lives. .
. quite a marketing magic trick. And the numbers speak for themselves.
According to their own financial statements, global sales usually increase by around 5% for the period of an Olympics or World Cup. That’s an average sales increase of about 600 million dollars per event. But Coca-Cola only pays around 100 million dollars to FIFA for each World Cup.
One study even found that Coca-Cola enjoyed a ‘statistically significant’ increase in popularity over Pepsi thanks to sponsorship campaigns for the Olympics. This would suggest that some of the sales boost that Coca-Cola enjoys during these events actually comes from Pepsi customers converting to Coca-Cola, at least for the duration of the tournament. This is why Pepsi decided to fight back… The rivalry between Coca-Cola and Pepsi is often referred to as ‘The Cola Wars’.
There’s even a Wikipedia page about it, so you know it’s serious. In 2006, Pepsi turned to football and signed Lionel Messi as an ambassador. Since then the brand has used him in several adverts which are conveniently released just before each World Cup.
This combination of star power and World Cup hype has generated millions of impressions for Pepsi, despite the brand not being an official sponsor of the World Cup. Pepsi’s 2018 World Cup advert was the most popular of the tournament, beating offerings from official sponsors Coca-Cola and McDonalds. It’s a brilliant example of ambush marketing.
This is when a brand creates a marketing campaign with the aim of associating itself with a major event, without actually paying for the privilege. Ambush marketing is very common during the Olympics and the World Cup because the organizers of these events have created exclusive sponsorship categories to increase revenues. Under its current agreements, Coca-Cola is the official and exclusive beverage of both events.
This makes it impossible for Pepsi to officially advertise during the two biggest sporting events on the planet…the only alternative is to ambush. The effort that Pepsi has gone through to try and steal attention from Coca-Cola during these events illustrates how impactful the sponsorship must be for the bottom line. Not that Coca-Cola should be overly concerned.
After Nike, Coca-Cola is the brand that people most relate to the Olympics. This might explain why Coca-Cola recently agreed to improve its partnership with the IOC, becoming the highest-level Olympic sponsor. It’s no surprise.
Coca-Cola has built one of the most powerful brands in the world by partnering with sports. Branding our brains by creating the flavor that reminds people around the world of the greatest moments in sporting history. Speaking of brains: we are often asked how we do the research for our videos.
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