Coca-Cola, a company whose Facebook fan count sounds like a share of a will, has had blogosphere, twittersphere, facbooksphere and all other social media spheres heated up or must i say chilled out. With over thirty two million fans on Facebook, more than three hundred and twenty two thousand followers on Twitter, five hundred plus members on Flickr, near about thirty three thousand subscribers on YouTube, and a full-fledged corporate blog, Coca Cola’s social media strategy is an exemplar of its kind.

Let’s hear the idea of Coca-Cola’s social media strategy from Natalie Johnson,the Digital Communications Manager herself:

“When you think about what your homepage is … it’s not necessarily just your brand page. It’s Google.com. It’s Digg. It’s Twitter. It’s YouTube. It’s Facebook. It’s all of these other sites, because that’s where people are going to obtain their information.”

With such a degree of earnestness, it’s no wonder that the company brags as many as five thousand mentions in a day! Whoa! That’s HUGE!

Image Courtesy – Coca-Cola

How earnest is Coca-Cola with its social media marketing?

The soft-drink giant is extremely serious about its social media activity and has its own set of social media principles. These social media principles are guided by what they call Coca-Cola’s 4 Rs – Review, Respond, Record and Redirect.

4 Key Components of Coca-Cola’s Social Media Strategy

• Review – The process of sieving of digital platforms to spot all mentions of Coca-Cola
• Respond – The art of engaging in dialogue/ conversation
• Record – The act of producing and uploading images, blogs, video vignettes etc on appropriate social media channels for meaningful entertainment.
• Redirect – The idea of directing social members to other purposeful social media content

6.6% deduction in Coca-Cola’s advertisement spending to invest more in SMM

The Grocer reports that in the year 2010, Coca-Cola cut it’s spending on advertisements by 6.6% so as to invest more in the social media sector. Now, that again goes into highlighting that Coca-Cola has plunged into the social space earnestly and that Coca-Cola’s social media strategy is just as fizzy as a chilled glass of Coca-Cola itself.

No wonder, Famecount acknowledges Coca-Cola as the number one brand  in social media presence on the list of top ‘Food Drinks Brand’.

Coca-Cola’s own socially seasoned website – Coke Zone

Coke Zone is Coca-Cola’s official fan community that was launched in January, 2008. The website is a wonder-house of incredible rewards and prizes ranging from ring-tones to movie tickets. The content on the site is intended to improve consumption of Coca-Cola, Coke Zero and Diet Coke by teenagers and females.

Coca-Cola’s lively corporate blog – Coca Cola Conversations

Coca-Cola joined the blogging community with its own corporate blog – Coca-Cola Conversations on 23rd January, 2008. Managed by Phil Mooney,archivist/ historian, Coca-Cola conversations includes ‘conversations’ on a spectrum of topics ranging from Coca-Cola’s involvement in World Cup and Olympics to real-life stories submitted by fans. In its initial year, Coca-Cola conversions featured more than two hundred stories that pulled almost eighty thousand readers. The blog still continues to be a roaring success

What is Coca-Cola’s unique social game-plan?

1) Letting fans roll-on the conversation 

On observing the company’s Facebook page, you will find that there are hardly any wall-posts by the company. I mean I perused through a lot many wall posts but could not find any from Coca-Cola official. It’s the fans doing all the talking.

And on those rare instances when the beverage giant initiated conversations, it was something very interesting and engaging like…“Have you ever dreamed of… swimming in coke?” So, that’s a pointer that Coca-Cola is not using social media for blatant advertising but for engaging fans.

2) Circulating Happiness Virals

‘Happiness Machine’ video was the first Coca-Cola video that was globally distributed as a part of the company’s viral marketing campaign. So far, the video has managed more than three million unique views. The company promoted the video largely on Twitter and Facebook with hooks directing back to the main YouTube page. Coca-Cola’s all other subsequent viral video generation and circulation efforts have been successful.

“The video was conceived as a way to connect with teens and young adults outside of TV ads and online games. We wanted to give them something that would spread a bit of happiness and something they could pass on to their friends to keep the happiness flowing.”.
 - A.J. Brustein, Global Senior Brand Manager at Coca-Cola

3) Making fans a part of all Coca-Cola adventures

 Although Coca-Cola sent just three ambassadors to all 206 countries as a part of their Expedition 206 campaign , they made the whole world a part of it. With a barrage of images, tweets, wall-posts, blogs, interviews et al, Coca-Cola made all its fans a part of their adventure.

The company seems to be drinking to its online social media success. If you’ve got 1.52 more minutes, I’ll leave you with this video …Cheers!