Coca-Cola and 7-Eleven partner for World cup campaign

The Digital Essentials, Part 3

Developing a robust digital strategy is both a challenge and an opportunity. Part 3 of the Digital Essentials guide series explores five of the essential technology-driven experiences customers expect, which you may be missing or not fully utilizing.

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We have talked about brands and retailers claiming their stake in the World Cup social conversations but not necessarily a retailer and brand partnering together.  Well that is what Coca-Cola and 7-Eleven have done with promoting World Cup excitement to help drive exclusive merchandise sales and brand engagement.  This is not the first time this brand and convenience store chain have teamed up and been successful so it made sense to target this audience together.

With an integrated in-store retail and digital strategy, Coca-Cola & 7-Eleven are creating a unique experience for their consumers surrounding the World Cup frenzy.  Tapping into the mobile movement, consumers can scan a QR code to access content for their mobile phones (ie. wallpaper, actual games, 7-Eleven app, etc), purchase commemorative soccer merchandise that feature this year’s World Cup and brand trademarks, and access the tournament games through the Coca-Cola website.  Although QR codes are not utilized as much as they have been in the past, both the retailer and brand have found them to still be an effective way to reach mobile users who are continually becoming familiar with how to interact with this kind of content.  Cameras are one of the most popular features of our phones and are utilized frequently to capture many different things.  QR codes are one feature for any phone that has a camera and browser which really encompasses majority of phones in this time and age.  “The ability to include a browser and a personalization experience, provide by the QR code and the wallpaper, enables these brands to tap into the Word Cup frenzy in a manner that is convenient, memorable and lasting,” said Brennan Hayden, vice president of mobile at [x+1], New York.[1]  Like other companies that have lent their voice to the World Cup social conversation, 7-Eleven and Coca-Cola hope to extend their reach and campaign longevity beyond the World Cup tournament with this mobile element.
This global campaign spans across 12 countries and 35,000 7-Eleven stores, the first time that this many stores have been involved in one main campaign at the same time. Due to the retail locations, each has a local, unique promotion that identifies with the specific products sold in those particular countries.
It just continues to excite me to see all of these promotional campaigns reaching such large audiences surrounding an amazing world event.  As the tournament comes to an end this weekend, it will be interesting to see the statistics of all of these campaigns, extension of their reach and how each brand or retailer plans to continue the social conversation with this large global audience.
 
 
[1] Source: http://www.mobilecommercedaily.com/7-elevens-global-coca-cola-promotion-taps-mobile-for-a-unified-experience