Download - A Winning Real-Time Formula: Insights from Coca-Cola's Wendy Clark #CannesLions #OgilvyCannes

A WINNING

REAL-TIMEfoRMuLA5 InsIghts from

WEndy CLARkSenior Vice President, Coca-Cola Disclosure: coca-cola

is an ogilvy client

The world is changing fast, and Wendy Clark, Coca-

Cola’s senior vice president of integrated marketing, had

some thoughts on why: millennials and teenagers have

two states of being: asleep, and connected. In the latter,

they’re constantly driving the conversation. To keep up, she

adheres by four mandates for instant communications.

A WInnInG In REAL-TIME foRMuLA

“sIlence Is not

An opTIon.” If you don’t speak, someone will speak for you. Coke

learned that 80 to 85% of Coke’s content is generated

somewhere outside of the brand—primarily a combination

of millennials, teens and other social audiences. “At

Coke, we have decided we are not willing to delegate

all our communication,” she said. Instead, the company

tries to work with the audience to co-create content—

as with Coke’s campaign to put names on cans.

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If you don’T spEAk, soMEonE WILL spEAk foR you.-Wendy Clark Senior vice preSient

coca-cola


speed trumps

pERfECTIon Clark gave a shout-out to Denny’s for one of the

latest in its line of clever, viral tweets: “BREAKING:

Denny’s Buys Beets for $3 billion, Makes Huge Salad,”

which riffed on news about the Apple-Beats deal.

“This tweet is a great example of real time,” Clark

said. “It’s authentic its in Denny’s brand voice. They

even managed to wedge the product in there.”

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the world needs

MoRE Good ConTEnT. But in our haste to have contextual relevance, we have to be

careful, Clark said. “We have to do work that matters,” she

said. “The goal isn’t to have more content; it’s more good

content.” Coke’s intelligence team determined that that

interest around music was getting stronger and stronger. “So

with SAP, we created a feature where people could switch the

language of their song,” she says. “They could listen to the

top trending songs in any of the four languages we provided.”

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do WoRk ThAT MATTERs-Wendy Clark Senior vice preSient

coca-cola



new models

of WoRkInG To both keep up and steer the conversation, Coke

now has two teams: the Hub and Hustle. The Hub

is a network of 23 social-engagement centers, all

connected to a center in Atlanta. The folks there

are constantly listening to and analyzing the

conversation and communication around our brand.

The Hustle acts like a newsroom. They source content

around the world, creating the conversation.

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coke and

soCCER As an example of tapping into real-time relevancy,

Clark spoke about Coke’s longstanding partnership

with the World Cup, which is a natural fit:

Football is an inclusive, democratic game, and

Coke is for everyone, Clark said. In one series

of 16 videos, blind soccer players get to touch

the World Cup trophy, which is brought to their

coaching center by Coke. (Usually only state

officials and winning teams are allowed.)

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