This morning I woke up with the intention of truly starting work, but got a little sidetracked reading the New York Times' Technology pages (yes, I AM a proud geek).
I came across this superb article by Jennifer Preston on PepsiCo's bail out of the Super Bowl auction and I have been pondering for the past hour about this strategic choice.
Last year, the soft drinks giant opted to target smaller communities through social media platforms in order to offer something more meaningful than yet another celebrity-endorsed, mass-mediated ad. Their $20 million social campaign project was coined Pepsi Refresh, and they were giving away grants to help various communities see their dreams come true. Here is an example of a project which was enabled by Pepsi's involvement:
Pepsi took a step back and did not make this campaign about its brand, and truly focused on making these projects come together. With the Harvard Business Review stats showing that 1/3 of companies do not even bother measuring the effectiveness of their social media campaign, I cannot help but wonder whether it is really necessary to pick our brains and see how to turn social effects into business and financial measures. Philanthropy is inevitably there to build a greater brand equity and enhance the customer's lifetime value. So why can't we consider social media campaigns as an act of "e-lanthropy"?
By engaging in such actions, companies can show that can be more than a passively watched advertisement on a television, or a mere choice among many on the shelves. Giving the brand a more humane form is a whole new dimension that companies can take advantage of nowadays. It shows that the company truly understands the world in which their consumers live in, without being obtrusive; and what a great word-of-mouth galvaniser...
So, win-win for everyone?
Jennifer Preston's NYT article can be accessed from here: http://nyti.ms/g7YRtE
I came across this superb article by Jennifer Preston on PepsiCo's bail out of the Super Bowl auction and I have been pondering for the past hour about this strategic choice.
Last year, the soft drinks giant opted to target smaller communities through social media platforms in order to offer something more meaningful than yet another celebrity-endorsed, mass-mediated ad. Their $20 million social campaign project was coined Pepsi Refresh, and they were giving away grants to help various communities see their dreams come true. Here is an example of a project which was enabled by Pepsi's involvement:
Pepsi took a step back and did not make this campaign about its brand, and truly focused on making these projects come together. With the Harvard Business Review stats showing that 1/3 of companies do not even bother measuring the effectiveness of their social media campaign, I cannot help but wonder whether it is really necessary to pick our brains and see how to turn social effects into business and financial measures. Philanthropy is inevitably there to build a greater brand equity and enhance the customer's lifetime value. So why can't we consider social media campaigns as an act of "e-lanthropy"?
By engaging in such actions, companies can show that can be more than a passively watched advertisement on a television, or a mere choice among many on the shelves. Giving the brand a more humane form is a whole new dimension that companies can take advantage of nowadays. It shows that the company truly understands the world in which their consumers live in, without being obtrusive; and what a great word-of-mouth galvaniser...
So, win-win for everyone?
Jennifer Preston's NYT article can be accessed from here: http://nyti.ms/g7YRtE
