The Brand
Coca Cola is a brand name that is known and recognized across the world. The Company was founded in 1886 and it has carried the brand name all along. A brand is the image and the recognition the organization has because of the products or the services it offers. It is what the customers identify with the company (Champniss and Vila 67). The brand creates identity of the organization with the customers.
The brand distinctiveness is always a combination of a name, symbol, logo, slogan, color or a signature. The name is the most important of all the components of a brand because its use in language will give a reference. All the other components in a brand can change over time, but the name will hardly change.
For instance, the Coca cola company has maintained its name ever since but the color and the writings of its logo has been changing over time. The writing on the Coca Cola bottle has changed severally over the years, but the name and the colors have remained the same. Pepsi Company too has its own logo which has been changing over the years but the name and the colors have remained the same (Beverland 87).
Pepsi Cola Company
Marketing and Marketing Mix
Marketing is an all embracing business activities that attempt to achieve the organization’s goals by meeting the customer’s expectations by means of delivering the right product or services at the right place at the right time in right quantities. It includes all the strategies employed in Business development, sales and communication that will eventually increase profits and create wealth for the stakeholders.
Marketing mix is a deliberate plan by the organization to control all the products components that is the product itself, the price, the place where the product will be found and the promotion of the product in the market. These components are adjusted until the optimal level is achieved where it best serves the interest of the customer and at the same time generating revenues for the organization (Cadogan 54).
Product overview
The Company has employed the market mix in the sale of it products, the Coca Cola or just Coke is one of the products which have carried the company’s brand name. There are over 3, 500 brands sold by the company world wide and in the UK there are about 20 different brands.
The coca cola brand in the UK has three variants. The Coca Cola which was introduced more than hundred years ago, the diet coke which was introduced about 30 years ago and the Coca Cola zero which was introduced in the market in 2006. The three brands are the leading product line for the company in the UK (Bodden 38).
Coca cola or just Coke is the most popular brand in the company that has generated more revenues and sales than any other. It has been found that coke is the most consumed liquid after water. This means the product is so popular and the demand is big. The design of the bottle known as the contour bottle is the famous one aimed at ensuring a firm grip in the hand when holding the bottle, Its design has remained the same ever since.
The drink is packed in bottles that vary from 2 liters, 1. 25 liters, 600 ml, 300 ml; they are also packed in cans usually 375mls. There are also packaging in plastic bottles of various sizes (Bodden 42).
Pricing
Pricing policy is among the primary goals of companies in the long run. For the Coca Cola Company to thrive in the market and be ahead of its competitors, the company has to pursue a pricing strategy which guarantees profitability and affordability to the end consumers. The company is the most popular and the biggest producer of soft drink and its products are among the cheapest.
This is possible through the low cost production giving the consumers, retailers and distributors real value for money. Because of its efficient distribution chain the company is able to produce en mass therefore enjoying economies of scale and therefore keeping the prices of the products low and raking in profits at the same time (Doole and Lowe 120).
Coke is still the best selling soft drink, although every product has different stages called the product life cycle which varies from the time it was introduced in to the market, it’s the growth over time and finally the maturity where some decline is experienced. The company has done great and in-depth analysis of the product life cycle and it has managed to maintain growth.
This has been achieved by introducing new variants of the same product for instance; in 1984 the Diet Coke was introduced in the UK market, this saw a big success in terms of sales and has kept the coke brand a head of other brands. Besides, it introduced other variants such as the Lemon, Vanilla and Caffeine free coke.
Coca Cola Company has managed to introduce new variants of the already existing products especially when the product has reached it maturity stage, thereby invigorating once again the life of the product and making competition even more intense in the market (Kotler and Lee 145).
The Place and the Distribution Channels
The right place where the product is found is a very important aspect as far as coke is concerned. The company has enormous distribution channels that ensure the product reaches every corner of the country, and this is not only in the UK, but across the globe.
The distribution system is so efficient and effective; it ensures supplies are in big superstores like Tesco or Sainsbury, small supermarkets, corner shops, petrol stations, restaurants, cafes, cinemas, clubs and bars. Virtually every shop stocks coke for sale in its shelves.
The company’s motto has been to find the product within an ‘arms reach of desire’, and it has really lived up to its saying. This is a strategy to ensure the product is accessed to by all the potential consumers, and the market to remains saturated with the product all the time (Grant 180).
The company uses the appointed distributors in the different sales regions to distribute their products to different outlets; there are salesmen who work closely with the distributors to ensure the supplies in the territory are at optimal levels.
These salesmen gather data on the availability of the products and any other complaints from the customers and retailers; the same is used to improve the services in future (Doole and Lowe 201).
Promotion
Promotion has been the major secret of coke’s success; it is through the promotion that the consumers become aware of the product. This is the link between the consumer and the product, when the link is met the outcome is always a big success. Coca cola has managed its promotions very well. The way the product is promoted and advertised will determine the success of the product in the market (Brassington and Pettitt 456)
Advertisement
The company so far has come up with most outstanding adverts, for example the special Christmas adverts featuring Santa Claus and the polar bear, the advert changed the perception people had for Santa Claus. It is such adverts and promotions that have made coke to stand out from the rest.
It is believed that Coca cola trade mark has almost 94 percent recognition all over the world and the word coke comes second as the most used words after the word Ok. To reach that level of popularity needs a lot of innovative ways of massive and consistent advertisements, and this is seen in the various advertisements made almost everywhere, in the newspapers, the magazines, radio, internet, billboards and Television (Grant 206).
Internet selling
Coca Cola Company uses its web page to promote some of its key marketing concepts. One of which is the demographic data gathering where the company will use to find which groups of consumers are using its products.
These consumer groups can be divided and subdivided over sex, age, interest, country residence and ethnicity. The data can be analyzed to give an insight of trends and which groups consume what brands.
This will give a direction of where to concentrate more efforts in future. This will also provide information on how to update their websites depending on the feedback information got from the customers visiting the site (Doodle and Lowe 403).
The company also uses its website on marketing by use of customer relationship Management (CRM) that is building and maintaining a lasting relationship with the customers by way of providing good customer service and keeping customers satisfied. This will keep the customer base growing and will boost profits in future.
From the website the company provides email links and telephone numbers where customers can contact the company with questions or any other complaints. There is also the frequently asked questions section where customers can find frequently raised issues concerning customer service.
Another internet selling concept is the demand management by allowing the users to customize the site after they have registered. In customizing the user will set which icons and links are visible, this process allows the company to market the products to certain group of people and consequently increasing demand on the target markets (Beverland 203)
Sales Promotions
There are different types of sales promotions the company has engaged in the UK, in the past the company has sponsored English football league, where the division one league was re branded as English Coca Cola Championship. The aim is to target the young generation and all the football funs.
‘A win a player’ was a very effective sales promotion of the company with a huge success, where and individual could participate by sending a text on a mobile phone or participating online.
An individual could win ₤0.25 million for his club of choice and a personal cash win of ₤ 10,000. To implement the promotion, massive TV advertisements, press and online advertising, in store POS materials, paintings were used extensively (Brassington and Pettitt 503).
Personal selling Promotions
The company has engaged in personal selling promotions in the past, for instance, in the months of May and June 2009, the coca cola company in UK started a mobile coupon campaign in partnership with i-movo Company where numerous products of the Coca Cola company were distributed to consumers using the digital voucher on the mobile phone.
Some selected PayPoint outlets were given Point of sale (POS) material and other posters which showed the simple steps required of any customer to get a free drink. The instructions were simple; the customer had to send a text massage ‘YES’ from their mobile phone including their date of birth. The customer gets a valid voucher code number instantly which is validated at the PayPoint terminal.
The company was able to monitor the progress of the campaign from one store to the other and the type of brands consumed in real time. The retailers of the products were reimbursed within a week through the PayPoint.
By the end of the promotional campaign which took about eight weeks, approximately 200,000 drinks were given away to about 100,000 customers all over the UK, this was recognized as the most effective and popular mobile phone campaign by the company in the UK.
This system allows the company to run a promotional campaign of some products in selected stores which facilitates sampling of various retail outlets without any costs of additional staff (Doole and Lowe 426).
Public Relation Exercise
The Coca Cola’s PR activity has been witnessed in several countries around the world, when the company is sponsoring of a major event like the FIFA world cup in 2010, they would like to get the pre-event time as part of the contractual package.
This gives the company to showcase their logo and their brand name and in addition the opportunity to create a unique experience towards the excitement preceding the main event (Champniss and Vila 304). The company’s PR in the forthcoming London Olympics in 2012 has already started in earnest, and the company has a long history with Olympic Torch relay.
Before the start of the Olympic Games the torch will pass through several cities in the UK and the company as one of the main sponsors of the event will have an opportune moment to present different PR strategies (Grant 312).
Conclusion
The company has employed the strategy of market mix in its history of business with the greatest ingenuity which has made it the world leader in soft drink market.
The types of promotions have made a permanent impression on the minds of customers and have translated into sales increase. The company spends a lot of money on advertisements and research to come up with new and innovative products that appeal to customers (Kotler and Lee 201).
Works Cited
Beverland, Michael. Building Brand Authenticity: 7 Habits of Iconic Brands. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. Print.
Bodden, Valerie. The Story of Coca-Cola. New York, NY: The Creative Company, 2008. Print.
Brassington, Frances and Stephen Pettitt. Principles of Marketing. 4th ed. New York, NY: Prentice Hall, 2006. Print.
Cadogan, John. Marketing Strategy: Marketing-mix Strategies. London: Sage Publishing. 2009. Print.
Champniss, Guy and Fernando Vila. Brand Valued: How Socially Valued Brands Hold the Key to a Sustainable. New York, NY: John Wiley and Sons, 2011. Print.
Doole, Isobel and Robin Lowe. International Marketing Strategy: Analysis, Development and Implementation. 5th ed. Washington, D. C.: Cengage Learning EMEA, 2008. Print.
Grant, John. Brand Innovation Manifesto: How to Build Brands, Redefine Markets and Defy Conventions. New York, NY: John Wiley and Sons, 2011. Print.
Kotler, Philip and Nancy Lee, Marketing in the Public Sector: a Roadmap for Improved Performance. New York, NY: Wharton School Publishing, 2007. Print.