The rivalry between two of the world’s most well-known brands is possibly unrivaled within the world today. If you haven’t seen the documentary called the Cola Wars, please do, because it helps set the foundations for the battle now raging within the digital space.

The twists and turns of this battle had many pivotal moments in history but none more so than when cola was shaken to its core by the Pepsi challenge. When Pepsi launched the Pepsi challenge, an easy taste test of one mouthful of cola and Pepsi, Pepsi overwhelmingly came out on top.

Why? it's relatively straightforward; Pepsi is sweeter, so every person chose the sweeter option because the one having more taste during a single shot.

But to confound true, the cola board panicked and adjusted its recipe launching one in every of the largest marketing failures of all time; New Coke! cola fans were outraged and commenced protesting the factories, so Coca-Cola, realizing their colossus mistake, withdrew New Coke and returned to the tried, tested, and extremely favored original recipe.

But the damage was done, and Pepsi's market share rose to where they stunning much sit today like two heavyweight boxers slugging it goes into an endless fight that benefits both brands.

This kind of competitive marketing battle shapes audiences into three camps. you have got die-hard fans of both Coca-Cola and Pepsi, whilst the battle rages for people who either don’t care, don’t mind, or don’t drink, or will switch between the brands.

Different Audiences
What the majority don’t understand is that dope and Pepsi target different audiences in their marketing.

Although you'll find people drinking either brand from teenager to grave, they target a selected key audience. Coca-Cola focuses on the 20 – 30-year-olds who are more settled and believe things like family, friendship, and heritage and have more responsible their turbulent teen years. Hence, the brand is consistent and stable with its branding.

On the opposite hand, Pepsi is about the new, the now, and uses current celebrity endorsements to push the ever-changing world of teenagers up to twenty. Pepsi is more likely to rebrand to suit what's happening without delay as they know their audience is heavily influenced by the changing worlds of art, music, and culture.

But time moves on, and it moves quickly within the digital space.
This epic battle between Pepsi and Coca-Cola continues to capture global audiences and doesn’t appear as if slowing down any time soon. In fact, with the demand for content within the social media space, expect things to escalate!

Try to think about this as two heavyweight champions dropping to bantamweight, which suggests they're quicker, throwing more punches than before, are more agile but still can land some powerful blows against one another. which is why this battle is so exciting!

Coca-Cola personalized the experience and won big!
The share a coke campaign which launched with the hashtag #cokemyname was a staggering success. Tapping into the newest print-on-demand technology, dope could print people's names on the famous red and white can.

Even those that don’t drink coke wanted a can with their name on it! Sharing the drink was one thing, but the number of shares through social media went nuclear! But they didn’t stop there.

The Coca Cola Happiness machine
Following the share a coke success with the dope happiness machine. Despite the boring name, this digital marketing campaign was very successful. This Coca-Cola slot machine dishes out drinks, pizza, flowers, and sandwiches.

What is remarkable about this machine is that some machines require a selected action to earn your rewards, just like the one in Singapore that needs a hug or the one in Belgium where you've got to bop to urge your reward. These engaging experiences were shared online, and this is often where great marketing comes into play.

The idea that the audience will share, distribute, and champion a brand or brand's activity is that the most vital change from traditional campaigns accustomed influence their audiences. If an audience is sharing content about the brand, the reach is more effective; it's more likely to be received by their micro audiences and change into viral sensations.

King of the recycle
Fantastic use of Facebook places in Israel was the ‘King of the recycle” campaign positioned 10,000 recycling bins in locations everywhere the country. People had to check in once they recycled plastic bottles, and at the top of the campaign, each area had a recycling king announced and rewarded. The campaign was an enormous success and helped people know where the recycling stations were and showed cola because the brand now related to them.

Tweet your Christmas wish
For the festive season in 2011, Coca-Cola made people feel incredibly special once they gave them an opportunity to own their tweets displayed on its enormous neon sign up Piccadilly Circus, London, UK. People were requested to send their messages through the Coke zone, and that they were then able to see it go on the billboard.

Super Bowl 2012
Another digital marketing campaign from Coca-Cola in 2012 was the Super Bowl campaign that involved two polar bears who reacted to events on the sphere in real-time. People were ready to interact with the polar bears. This was done via Facebook and Twitter, and when the bears responded, they pulled out a smartphone to tweet.

The friendship experiment
In China, people were asked to participate in Coca-Cola’s digital marketing campaign called the ‘Friendship experiment’. The photographer they used was Kurt Tang, who asked people to require part during a moment of the connection while touring Guangzhou.

The campaign drew great interest as Kurt approached individuals and couples in an exceeding park where he asked them to share a candid moment and a coke with strangers. His images sparked a movement across social media and were hailed as a hit in bringing people together.

Digital media campaign
For two weeks, Coca-Cola ran a digital forecourt screen effort to lift sales of the 500ml Coca-Cola and Coke Zero. This 10-second ad motivated people to go to their site, cokezone.co.uk, to ‘win immeasurable happy prizes instantly’. Coca-Cola, of course, used the 500ml Coca-Cola and Coke Zero bottles on the ad.

Things don’t always head to plan…
Pepsi’s advert featuring Kendall Jenner

Pepsi faced a substantial backlash to an ad featuring Kendall Jenner saw her giving police a can of Pepsi on the battlefront of a protest.

The advert was meant to portray a message of peace, unity, and understanding but instead was criticized for trivializing social justice demonstrations.

In the advert, Kendall gives a lawman a can of Pepsi; he then smiles at a fellow officer as protestors cheered.

The backlash from the advert suggested that if protestors were kinder and gave police a drink, there would be no need for social justice demonstrations.

The public mocked the campaign with key influencers like Bernice King, Martin Luther King Jr’s daughter, tweeting an image of her father with the caption: If only Daddy had known the ability of #Pepsi.

This may are a battle lost by Pepsi, but things don’t stand still for long within the cola wars. And Pepsi has also had some huge successes by thinking outside the can.

How Pepsi broke the mold
In 2009, Pepsi decided to ax their Super Bowl movement for Super Bowl XLIV in Miami, Florida. Instead, they're dumping 20 million dollars into a Social Media Marketing campaign. Pepsi’s move exemplifies the main shift in advertising dollars that we've got seen develop over the past year.

As corporations large and tiny still pull advertising dollars from traditional markets like television, newspaper, and print, we see these funds relocated to online campaigns that engage customers and permit advanced statistical tracking.

This marks the primary year in 23 years that Pepsi didn't develop a poster for the Super Bowl. Pepsi should be commended for a move that the majority of marketers wouldn’t dream of stepping removed from because the risk was huge. because the world had come to expect a TV commercial during the Superbowl, Pepsi’s move showed it absolutely was in reality with the changing face of business, culture, and digital marketing.

Pepsi Refresh Project
“Pepsi is gifting away millions every month to fund great ideas.”
Pepsi allowed businesses, people, and non-profits to submit their ideas that they believe had a positive impact. One thousand ideas were accepted each month. Anyone could submit a concept, and also the community was asked to vote, which again was another masterstroke for the campaign.

People were allowed to vote for ten ideas per day, and voting closed at the tip of the month. as an example, 1000 ideas had been submitted for February; voting for these ideas began on Feb. 1, with the winner being chosen by the tip of February.

The prizes were as follows:

-$5,000 for up to 10 awardees per month. this is often best for people.
-$25,000 for up to 10 awardees per month. for people and tiny groups.
-$50,000 for up to 10 awardees per month. For companies and organizations.
-$250,000 for up to 2 awardees per month. this is often for giant organizations.

There were six categories to submit to; Health, Arts & Culture, Food & Shelter, The Planet, Neighborhoods, and Education.

Pepsi encompasses a continuously young and edgy vibe about all its communication, which is visible online. Celebrity endorsements, bold street style graphics, and heavy use of the most recent music trends keep Pepsi a favorite for the younger generation. Each of the social media accounts, that the Pepsi brand has many deliver this attitude with aplomb.

Coca-Cola’s steadfast community empowerment “Open Happiness” style, which encompasses a far greater appeal to an older generation, shows the difference in how each brand targets its audience.

The most exciting thing about the war for attention both cola and Pepsi find themselves in is that they wouldn’t draw the maximum amount of attention without the competition. thanks to the competition and, more importantly, how the fans of every defend, promote, and champion each brand make everything they are doing so enjoyable to observe.