Coca Cola’s Most Memorable Ads

June 1, 2017 by John Partilla

Coca-cola is a global leader and their might isn’t easily challenged within the beverage industry. They’ve provided the public countless products and brands, including an absurd variety of fruit juices, sports drinks, and other beverages. The refreshment company can credit a great deal of their success to their ad choices and marketing decisions. Read on to learn a bit about some of Coca Cola’s most memorable ads:

Hilltop

This 1971 ad is probably the most memorable Coca-Cola ad there is, featuring a song that is recognizable even to those born after it aired. It, like many successful Coke ads, features a song and is almost music video-like in format. The video shows a lone singer, who is quickly joined by a crowd of people, singing “I’d Like to Buy the World a Coke.” The singers, according to the end of the video, are “young people from all over the world.” The ad’s emphasis on community and happiness is also typical of Coke ads. This message has persisted in Coke ads even up until the present day.

Always Coca Cola

This 1993 ad is the only one on this list not to feature characters–neither humans, nor anthropomorphized non-humans appear during it. Instead, it plays a short, catchy song, accompanied by very simple imagery: the coke logo on a flashing background, with projected lyrics. Thus, music–which is already, as stated above, a very important feature in many Coca-Cola ads–is given importance over everything else.

Catch

Here’s a much more recent commercial from Coke. This commercial also doesn’t feature any humans, although it does have humanlike animals: a number of adorable animated polar bears, starring the clumsy but loveable NE_Bear. This was not the first time polar bears were used in Coke advertising, and it wouldn’t be the last. Polar bears were first used in a 1993 advertisement, in an animated TV spot entitled “Northern Lights.” There have also been several polar bear ads after 2012. But “Catch,” is especially cute, simple, and well worth the watch.

Heist

For more animals enjoying Coke, there’s “Heist”, a 2009 Superbowl commercial that won that year’s Emmy for “Best Commercial.” In “Heist”, insects join forces to steal a sleeping man’s Coke, their colorful exploits set to the music of Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf. The commercial is bright and cheerful, and though stealing a Coke seems at first to go against the usual idea of “sharing a Coke”, the ad nonetheless touches the usual points of teamwork and community building.

Taste the Feeling

Here’s an ad that strives to recreate the music video-like “Hilltop” with more modern sensibilities. The song, by the artists Avicii and Conrad Sewell, does not sound like an advertising jingle: the word “Coke” itself is only used twice, and the shape of the song does not draw very much attention to this product placement. But given Coke’s recognizability, that’s not a bad thing, and the wholesome, fun-loving qualities that mark Coke advertising are here too, to the cheery sound of dance music.

John Partilla is the CEO of Screenvision, and he’s a veteran of the marketing industry with nearly three decades of experience in a variety of roles. Please read “John Partilla Named Screenvision CEO,” “John Partilla: Screenvision Names Exec CEO – Variety,” “Screenvision Taps John Partilla To Be CEO As It Seeks To Rebuild” and his Screenvision profile to learn more. Also, check out his Crunchbase, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

The Growing Use of Ad Blocking

April 2, 2016 by John Partilla

A recent report from ComScore has confirmed that around ten percent of desktop users are currently applying ad-software blocking tools or systems when perusing the internet. Though this ad blocking rate on a global scale has been relatively stable from around September to May of last year, it is clear that the likelihood of using ad blocking software is directly tied to generational differences.

The study showed that younger users are more inclined to employ ad blocking tools rather than individuals who are over the age of 34.

ComScore, a public marketing data company who offers analytics to publishers, agencies and large private entities in order to better understand consumer behavior across audiences on different platforms. This marketing data company heavily focuses on constantly examining factors within digital advertising from TV to the new ways brands are engaging with consumers in the mobile sphere.

With ad blocking increasing in popularity, it becomes more difficult for online publishers to not only yield engagement, but also reflect consumer data when creating strategy or number based plans in comparison with their competitors.

Basically, online publishers are sometimes unable to pull accurate data reflecting important KPI’s such as viewability, completion rate and cost per acquisition in the programmatic sphere.

However, as publishers and companies within the advertising industry alike become more concerned with these ad-blocking technologies, comScore’s data suggests that these trends do not seem to have any immediate impacts.

To illustrate, one survey conducted by Retale confirms that out of five-hundred informants, fifty-seven percent admitted to using ad-blocking tools on their desktop computers.

Meanwhile, a report published last year by Adobe and PageFair, confirmed that U.S. ad-blocking rates were 17% in May and 15% in June, which is nearly five to seven percent more than ComScore numbers. In addition, the companies also estimated that ad blocking tools and software led to $22 billion in lost advertising revenue last year alone.

Regardless of the numerical disparity between these three companies, ComScore’s numbers are actually aligned with various online publishers who have recently seen a decline in revenue due to ad blocking. Although ComScore numbers currently do not encompass ad blocking on mobile devices which is a far less common among consumers. To read more about ad blocking with regard to desktop users please visit this site.

Instagram’s New Branding Strategy

March 11, 2016 by John Partilla

As opposed to the nature of social media platforms such as Facebook or Twitter, Instagram was initially created to emphasize activities solely related to sharing visual mediums online.

With over four hundred million monthly users and a growing number of advertisers branding their companies on the platform, Instagram is adding an algorithm that reorders pictures and videos in users’ feeds based on their interests. Similar to a news feed in Facebook or the extensive Twitter feed, this actually allows the constant flow of information to be context specific with the hopes to promote a much higher level of user engagement across the board.

Although marketers claim this inevitable move is a small part in the overall social media evolution, users are becoming more and more wary of the next steps the company will take to secure its innovative edge as the digital industry further expands.

Moreover, as the photo-sharing app further expands its strategy to drive engagement on their photo sharing based platform, Instagram has also acquired new interactive tools in addition to simply just the news feed. Users can now message followers directly, click into link that lead them to product or service landing pages and upload videos showcasing their latest trip with their friends.

However, many argue that this isn’t exactly what the online photo sharing app’s user base was searching for when the platform was first developed in 2010 by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger to socially network via photos. According to a Forrester Research report form 2015, engagement on this platform had declined significantly yet data still showed that the platform still outperformed social media competitors such as Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and Google +.

“Maybe it’s dramatic to call it the death of organic social, but increasingly, we’re telling our clients, ‘If you’re not going to put money behind promoting your content, organic engagement is a real tough thing to produce sustainably,” said Kyle Bunch, managing director of social at R/GA.

According to Instagram analytics, users miss 70 percent of the posts that show up in their feeds, meaning they only see 30 percent of the content posted by users and brands they follow. In turn, this creates a huge informational disconnect between users who are not receiving the content geared towards their interests and the brands attempting to portray a certain message to targeted audiences.

Kyle Bunch, managing director at R/GA states that “I don’t believe Instagram will go full-fledge Facebook with its suppression of all organic reach for content,” she said. “The Instagram community is just different and expects a level of authenticity and accessibility that isn’t reflected on Facebook.”

While this is useful tool that could potentially connect users and brand in a more effective way, some users agree that this could actually have a negative impact on the various ways in which individuals discover new information.

Disconnecting from the Digital Space

February 18, 2016 by John Partilla

The increase of wifi spots across New York City, along with a wide spectrum of global, cosmopolitan cities have all been participating in a digital connectedness as a means for locals, tourists and passerbyers alike to all stay interactive on their devices. While this was primarily initiated to further connectedness on social media platforms, to promote engagement via text messaging and internet browsing, both Olson and Roder of Horizon’s TrendSights have concluded that becoming a “smart city” may not necessarily spark an overall increase in user engagement.

With this in mind, Horizon’s TrendSights has concluded that there is an increase of consumers who have essentially opted to not connect to wifi kiosks or hotspots in order to maintain face to face interaction. In short, the intent on becoming more connected through the implementation of everything wifi has resulted to a response that has produced a quest to for more personal, undistracted personal space from their devices.

Although both Olson and Roder have noticed this trend gradually appearing in consumer and social behavior, they agree that the increased effort on the consumer’s behalf to distance themselves from their devices has been far more noticeable in the past six months. Olson comments on this trend by stating that “Most people have had smartphones for awhile now, but I think people had to kind of live with them for a while and internalize all the effects the phones have on one’s life before they felt this itch to return to a more disconnected life.”

As this concept of distance from devices has augmented within the last year or so, consumers have been responding in different forms in order to counteract what they feel is the lack of meaningful social engagement.

More concretely, one interesting that has been making a strong statement as an overall response to the digital connectedness as a whole, is the fad of adult sleep-away camps that mandate an environment which calls for no devices or anything digitally related.

An adult sleepaway camp called “Camp Grounded,” has locations from New York to Northern California and offers features like typewriters, stargazing, sweat lodges and gourmet cuisine in the hopes of visitors to take a step back from their busy, digitally occupying lives.

This essentially highlights how adamantly digital consumers of all ages are actively attempting to create more authentic, face to face human interaction in their daily lives. To read more about how consumers are disconnecting from the digital space click on this link.

Sports Ad Sales Continue to Increase

September 10, 2015 by John Partilla

Many have been proclaiming that the days of television will soon come to an end. They harp on this notion that live sports are the only thing allowing broadcast television to remain on air. While this is far from being true, new data does, in fact, suggest that sports are accounting for an increasing percentage of the industry’s sales.

Kantar media recently released a report that shows thats sports oriented programming generated upwards of $8 billion across NBC, Fox, ABC, and CBS from 2014 to 2015. This number accounts for more than a third, (37%), of these networks’ total revenue over those years. This $8.47 billion is a marked increase from 2010 when live sports generated less than $6.5 billion for the big four networks.

According to the report, CBS accounted for nearly $3 billion of this, an eleven percent increase from their number last year. Fox and NBC finished second and third, respectively. ABC, which is the only network amongst these four that doesn’t broadcast NFL games, raked in about $1 billion. However, it should be noted that the Walt Disney Company owns both ABC and ESPN. Last year, ESPN sold more than $2.4 billion in ads.

The largest spenders for sports broadcasts include companies in the Auto, Telecom, and Beer industries. Chevrolet, Budweiser, Verizon and Geico were the four largest spenders last year, each shelling out upwards of $250 million according to the report.

Of the fifty most watched broadcasts of the last year, forty-five of these were NFL matches, twenty-four of which did not even take place during primetime. That stat alone demonstrates the NFL’s dominant position amongst US sports.

These numbers really shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who keeps up with the industry. Beyond that of a few award shows and highly successful dramas, sports programming is the only segment that almost always attracts a huge live-audience.

Pandora to Alter Ad Strategy

July 2, 2015 by John Partilla

Many thousands of viewers enjoy the music selection Pandora has to offer. With randomly assembled playlists and a limitless supply of artists and tracks, the service draws thousands upon thousands of users every day. With that level of exposure, Pandora is one of the premier players in the music streaming industry. Debuting their latest program to bring in additional revenue through ad campaigns, Pandora is looking to tune up their business.

Pandora CEO, Brian McAndrews

Using their newly created ad exchange, Pandora is privately auctioning off ad space to companies they have a history of working with. Using a system of over 350 customized targeting matrices, Pandora is able to match a specific ad to the listener most likely to benefit. By doing this, Pandora hopes to eliminate unnecessary ads cluttering the user’s experience, and increase positive response to their clientele’s campaigns.

Choosing only to work with established businesses who’ve worked with them in the past, Pandora hopes to build a more reputable advertising base without allowing third-party programs to muddy the waters. “In order to be able to transact with transparency as well as target first-party data, you have to have a direct relationship with Pandora to buy into the marketplace,” said Jack Krawczyk, VP Product manager at Pandora. By flooding their popular program with unnecessary advertisements, Pandora would not only turn away listeners, but damage a brand that’s been building for the past decade.

Prior to the inclusion of Pandora’s ad exchange program, companies primarily used banner ads to attract attention back to their sites. While this did work in some respect, the numbers were small, and most ads went unnoticed by the majority of mobile users. Pandora believes that this change in direction will increase the level of in-app purchases performed by mobile Pandora users. With a rate of $34.92 in revenue per 1000 mobile listeners to the $58.04 of PC users, Pandora hopes the new approach will help increase the functionality of their mobile advertisements.

Though interruptions are rarely welcome while listening to music, Pandora is doing its best to avoid increasing what few ads are present. Instead, by focusing on more user specific, analytically driven ad placement, Pandora hopes to improve the listening experience for everyone involved.

Using Rocket Science to Gain an Advantage in Marketing

May 29, 2015 by John Partilla

The startup DataXu utilizes software, initially designed to be used on NASA space missions, in order to show customers the most relevant ads online. DataXu which was founded the MIT alumnus Bill Simmons and Sandro Catanzaro leverages the big data about consumer demographics behavior in order which to help companies receive the largest ROI possible. The software analyzes past online behavior and preferences as well as utilizing data from third party sources regarding the users demographic, general interests, and purchase history. DataXu instantly analyzes all of this data to determine the specific ad from their large group of potential clients that will spur the user to take action, whatever that may be.

Advertising and marketing have by no means been an exact science throughout its history. The data regarding Return on Investment was largely an approximation, and took months to collect. This has changed dramatically as DataXu has the capability of precisely measuring ROI numbers. They are trying to break advertising down to a science and remove its uncertainty. Companies are apparently eager to employ such an approach as DataXu boasts such as Ford, Lexus, and 3M. The results speak for themselves. Ford experienced a twenty percent jump in online shopping outcomes with DataXu services.

The DataXu software was originally created by Simmons and Catanzaro while studying systems architecture with MIT Professor Ed Crawley. The team originally designed the software for NASA to determine the most practical manned missions to Mars. They narrowed down the count of feasible missions to just 1,162 from the original 35 billion potential options. The most impressive feature of this software was actually its speed. Normally, it would take quite some time to analyze all 35 billion options. But the software quickly eliminated options that were clearly unfeasible. This is what separates them from the pack, especially in the world of online advertisements in which things happen in a matter of milliseconds. NASA was mightily impressed by the team’s work as have been the customers of DataXu.

Digital Ad Revenue Soaring

April 23, 2015 by John Partilla

According to Laurie Sullivan from MediaPost.com, the Internet Advertising Revenue or IAB recently released a report showing that the American digital advertising revenue increased by more than fifteen percent in 2014. Last year, total revenue in this space was just below the $50 billion mark. $14.2 billion of this came in Q4 of 2014, which was a 17% increase from the previous quarter.

If you take a closer look at this data, you will see that ads in social media rose an incredible fifty-seven percent to over $7 billion in 2014. The growth of this number over the course of the year is even more impressive. Of this $7 billion, $4.1 billion came in the final six months of 2014. Over the last three years, the compounded annual growth rate sits at a remarkable fifty-five percent.

David Silverman for PWC notes how brands have finally determined how to make money from the investments they have made in social media over the last few years. The market for this platform has really matured.

Sullivan reports that the cost per click for advertisements that appear on social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook, etc. have increased in recent years. Sullivan also points out that these higher prices could influence how brands allocate their money in the future.

Brian Wieser, an analyst form Pivotal Research Group, believes that the numbers, if you dive into the data, indicate something else. The lion’s share of the growth can actually be attributed to that of Google and Facebook. If you remove these two tech giants from the data, digital advertising revenue only experienced a marginal increase.

In this article, Sullivan also reports that investments in the mobile space increased twenty-five percent last year, and now sit higher than $12 billion. Search remains the leader in advertisement revenue with it accounting for nearly $20 billion in 2014.