J&J, John Lewis, Coca-Cola: 5 things that mattered this week and why

From Coca-Cola’s first multi-brand campaign to rebrands fromJohnson & Johnson and John Lewis, we round up all the marketing news you need to know from the past week.

By Marketing Week Reporters 29 Jun 2018 2:33 pm

Coca-Cola launches first multi-brand campaign

Coca-Cola has launched its annual summer marketing campaign, but this year there is a twist. For the first time it will be a multi-brand campaign with Fanta, Sprite, Coca-Cola and Dr Pepper appearing side-by-side in its ads.

The summer marketing push is around on-pack promotional competitions to win “unforgettable” experiences including lavish holidays such as whale watching in Iceland. It’s the company’s attempt to appeal to the coveted millennial audience coming off the back of research that says millennial’s value experiences over material goods .

The campaign will run on TV at the end of the current Diet Coke ad and all promotional packs will feature a Coca-Cola sun. It’s not often that the company acknowledges that its other brands are under the Coke umbrella so the move is not insignificant and it will be interesting to see if this is the beginning of more marketing collaborations.

But it makes sense. Coca-Cola is facing major disruption as consumer habits change, sales head online and own-label becomes ever more attractive. Pulling all its brands together under one campaign clearly saves money – spreading the cost of advertising across a number of brands rather than running separate spots for each one while keeping them top of mind.

John Lewis and Waitrose rebrand

A big week for brand architecture stories has also seen news that John Lewis and Waitrose have rebranded; from September they will be known as John Lewis & Partners and Waitrose & Partners.

Amid struggles on the high street and retail disruption, this is a clear move to point to the two brands’ point of difference – their employee-ownership business model and the service and care provided by staff. It also makes it much clearer that the two brands are owned by the same company – the John Lewis Partnership – which they have in the past deliberately avoided pointing out.

John Lewis and Waitrose have been quietly working more closely together in recent years – first through click-and-collect and then in advertising when they appointed the same creative agency in adam&eveDDB. But it seems a costly move at a time when retailers are facing challenges from multiple directions and one that could leave many consumers confused as to what the ‘& Partners’ bit means. That will require some clear communication.

Johnson & Johnson rebrands after listening to customer feedback

‘If it’s not broke don’t fix it’ is a common phrase and one heard all too often in business. It’s not one familiar to Johnson & Johnson though, which this week unveiled a total revamp of its babycare range – despite being the world’s number one brand in the market.

While it was once OK for the brand to rely on science to sell its products, consumers today demand transparency. They want to know exactly what’s going into the things they buy, particularly when it comes to baby products.

Consumers have access to so much more information than they used to thanks to the rise of social media, and attitudes have changed so rather than ignoring criticism and relying on brand legacy – which many successful brands are guilty of – it has taken on board consumer concerns and overhauled its entire offer.

Johnson & Johnson has taken dyes out of its signature products and revealed all the ingredients it includes for the first time – something which was once a trade secret, as well as introducing a new bottle design which makes it easier hold and use with one hand (while holding a baby in the other).

Johnson & Johnson’s CMO Alison Lewis admits the brand hasn’t always listened so intently to customers, and says it would never have walked away from its “sacred cows” a few years ago. But to meet consumers’ evolving demands it requires almost starting again with a blank slate and acting like a startup launching a business in today’s market.

Moving with the times and understanding that what was once successful won’t necessarily always be is a valuable lesson for all big multinational businesses. All too often brands get bogged down with the day to day and focus on short-term results rather than looking at the bigger picture and considering what might impact the bottom line in the long term.

Love Island drives not only viewers but sales for Missguided

The breakout TV hit of the summer (judging by the chatter in the MW office anyway) is once again ITV 2’s Love Island. Regularly drawing in crowds of almost three million most female millennials, it offers brands an increasingly rare opportunity to target this demographic.

And it’s proving a win not only for ITV 2 but for brands tapping into its appeal. One such retailer is Missguided, which has partnered with the reality show to drive up awareness of the breadth of its offering. The contestants are wearing its clothes, with the outfits featured on the Live Island app, alongside an option to purchase.

And marketing boss Kenyatte Nelson says this has led to a sales increase of around 40% during the evenings Love Island is on.

The partnership is smart from Nelson and shows how a brand in tune with its target customers can reach them in new and surprising ways. Previously, Missguided focused on Instagram, and while it is still an important platform, Love Island is providing a new way to talk to its core customers with “depth, frequency and high levels of engagement.”

At the half-way mark of the World Cup, an unlikely brand is leading the ad stakes

Even if you’re not a football fan chances are you’ve seen a World Cup ad, or dozens.

And with the group stages complete and England through the top 16, football fever has reached new heights, but you can’t say the same for Adidas and Nike when it comes to their World Cup campaigns.

According to data provided exclusively to Marketing Week by System1, big brands have fallen flat, UK ad makers are struggling and it’s an unlikely brand leading the way.

US online shopping portal Wish takes top spot for its ‘Time On Your Hands’ campaign, on emotional engagement. It scored three out of five stars (based on ROI growth).

Wish recruited football legends such as Italian goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon for its campaign, with this ad in particular winning the attention of British consumers, with an ’emotion into action’ score of 76.5% – the highest of any ad in the ranking.

In the UK, Nike only managed to score two stars for its ad celebrating Brazilian street ‘futbol’ while Adidas achieved a flimsy one star for its celebrity-packed ‘Create The Answer’ campaign which has been labelled an “emotional bomb”.

System 1’s head of communications Tom Ewings says UK ad makers failed because consumers have low expectations of England, so advertisers focused on fans rather than players.

“But there was an undercurrent of genuine liking for this England team which canny advertisers could have tapped into. And then the on-field performances so far have boosted that feeling a lot. Advertisers didn’t spot that feel good factor and so they’ve missed out,” he says.