The Campaign

In 2015, Coca-Cola China chose to play around with their packaging for the third consecutive year, as they faced the challenge of creating a Summer campaign that was bigger, better, fresher and more interesting than the previous two years, and importantly sell more Coke. Anchoring the Summer campaign in the drama and language of cinema, which was activated across packaging, digital, broadcast, OOH and movie partnerships, resulted in volume sales performance exceeding expectations and astonishingly outperforming the previous two years. Proving our hypothesis: ‘In China there’s always a drama waiting to happen’.

Success of the Campaign

In 2013, the Nickname Coke campaign delivered a 20% increase in volume sales compared to the previous year. In 2014, volume sales grew a further 6% (in the coldest summer for 30 years) to set a new record. In 2015, the objective was to continue growth, however with such outstanding results two years running, there was doubt. At the end of July 2015: • The total campaign social impressions had grown to 6.5 billion (+265% year-on-year). • Campaign engagement grew to 33 million (+1860% year on year). • Volume sales had jumped a further 5% year on year. The summer of 2015 has been dramatically successful, once again, for Coca-Cola China.

Describe how the campaign/entry was launched and executed across each channel in the order of implementation.

The TV referenced the ‘Dino-tastic’ Jurassic Park series and ‘Epic Battles’ from ancient China, while the desirability of Coca-Cola remained the central component to the storyline. The same imagery ran across Out of Home. Online video platform Youku produced a series of films around alternative endings to the ‘Epic Battle’ TVC, which included: Dinosaur launched in Jun; Battlefield launched in Jul. A suite of augmented reality video tools was also created, allowing the audience to develop their own drama, while putting themselves in the main role, these included: being attacked by a giant dinosaur or magically teleported into the scene of film clips personally made by the audience. These clips were also hosted on the Youku platform. A key partnership was with the famous Chinese film company Huayi brothers on their film ‘Only You’, which was produced by Feng Xiaogang. A Coke version of the movie poster was produced and Coca-Cola activated the film premiere and even the VIP gift box.

2013, Coca-Cola China’s twist on its summer ‘Share-A-Coke’ platform was exploring online culture, which resulted in an increase of sales by 20% over the previous year. 2014, with the introduction of music culture Coca-Cola experienced an even bigger hit – even in one of the countries coldest summers in 30 years. With two hits, an equation was formulated to express what was thought to be happening: Iconic Coke + Cultural Value = Campaign Success. Daily life can be pretty boring in China. Not a lot happens. However the Chinese have a knack for turning the smallest incident or the slightest disagreement into a massive drama. Realizing by injecting the drama of classic movie moments into any situation, Coca-Cola could be placed at the center of the drama of daily life. The drama of classic movie moments could make any situation funnier, crazier.Idea was: ‘Share-A-Coke to add Drama to your Summer’.