TABLE OF CONTENTS

Contents Page

Table of Contents i

INTRODUCTION 1

PART A: BRAND MARKETING AND COMMUNICATION 2

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1.0 The SodaStream Earth Day Campaign 2
How this campaign work 2
Opportunities, challenges and impact on Brand reputation 2
2.0 Dove’s Reverse Selfie 3
How this campaign work 3
Opportunities, challenges and impact on Brand reputation 4
3.0 Guinness 4
How this campaign work 4
Opportunities, challenges and impact on Brand reputation 4
4.0 Avatar of Prince; “the man he was destined to become” 5
How this campaign work 5
Opportunities, challenges and impact on Brand reputation 5

PART B: GUIDELINES FOR SIMILAR BRANDS IN THE FUTURE 7

Purpose-based Approach to Product Ethos, Vision, Service 7
Communicating with Audience and Stakeholders 7
Measuring the desired Consumer behaviour change 8
Measure the Success of the Brand’s Marketing Approach 9
CONCLUSION 10
REFERENCES 11

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 Brand Communication and Reputation Management

INTRODUCTION
There are different types of marketing communication, this includes advertising, sales
promotion, events, sponsorships, PR, direct method of marketing, marketing by word of mouth
or personally selling to people (Milichovsky, 2013). These can be known as marketing mix.
They are needed to help generate awareness and plant whatever product we are marketing into
the subconscious of the end users, the main purpose is to connect with the targeted users
effectively, whichever mode we decide to go with. This like every other discipline comes with its
opportunities and challenges with each approach that is adopted regardless of whichever media it
uses.

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PART A: BRAND MARKETING AND COMMUNICATION

Advertising is part of the function of marketing communication (Kalam, 2020). It allows a brand
to control what they want to send to the end users and also create ads for campaigns like the four
brands that we will be considering below. The following four marketing campaigns will be
analysed as a case study:

1.0 The SodaStream Earth Day Campaign

Critically analysing the SodaStream Earth Day Campaign, there are different methods of
marketing being used. Due to the advanced technology, there is no marketing that should not be
supported digitally, it is important to improve on the process of advertising to meet new
challenges that might be faced with the old days before moving digitally. Kotler & Caslione
(2009) in their study talks about the importance of influencing customers through a large group
(in the case of this advert, a very popular personnel).

How this campaign work

This approach of advertising creates in the viewers subconscious the need to stop mindless
sharing and also start to take action. Facebook owned by Mark Zuckerberg, is the social media
platform with the highest user all over the world, using a video that shows him stressing on the
need to take actions and transform social problems into a real thing by taking a stand in reality
will boost the response of the viewers to such an action.

A memorable video ad will inevitably go with word of mouth, which is a traditional tool of
advertising, because of the large usage of internet, the ad can be guaranteed to get to every
corner of the globe. Word of mouth can also be a new tactic used in digital advertising through it
being used with digital marketing (Wu & Wang, 2011).

Opportunities, challenges and impact on Brand reputation

From a reputational point of view, an ad like the SodaStream Earth Day Campaign featuring
Randi Zuckerberg will give a major boost to the credibility of the brand, considering that a year
before that, Snoop Dogg was also used by the brand for a festive campaign, interacting with
endangered turtle to also reduce the amount of single-used plastic.
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Part of the challenge faced with this kind of marketing approach is the legal dispute that it may
cause. An article by Simon Gywnn (2021) on CampaignLive showed that SodaStream was in a
dispute with the bottled water industry over what was seen as a provocative ad inspired by games
of throne over this kind of a campaign. Another challenge to this campaign is the sensitivity of
not wanting to fully encourage people to mindlessly share because the campaign needs more than
just an engagement, it needs real action. Looking at that, there is major need to share to raise
awareness but there is no express encouragement from the campaign to share because the need to
take action for this is greater than the need to have another ad flood the internet mindlessly. Too
much similar characteristics in the market is not too great for business, as it’s impossible for a
brand to target everyone (Weinstein, 1998). Therefore, a choice must be made by the firm.

2.0 Dove’s Reverse Selfie

Marketing communication is the process of direct or indirect informing of the target audience of
any brand solution to a problem and it should be clearly stated to the audience the need for that
brand to be noticed (Kotler & Keller, 2009).

How the campaign work

The Dove’s reverse selfie campaign is a good illustration of the above definition, this campaign
highlighted the need for the impact of the social media selfie on children. The method of
marketing also used here is the digital marketing, which also stretched to viral marketing,
guerilla marketing. The main aim of guerilla marketing is to boost the awareness of the brand to
the audience while diversifying and using information collected by own marketing
communication (Roy & Chattopadhyay, 2009; Milne et al., 2008).

It can also be said that this campaign uses a form of reputation marketing. Using better review
from the internet for unfiltered pictures and working strategically to improve upon the influence
that the campaign has. Reputation marketing can be done through addition of reviews to
marketing, inclusion of public opinions on videos and ads, like it was done with this campaign
video to improve trustworthiness and achieve a competitive edge over other brand.

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Opportunities, Challenges and Impact on Brand reputation

Using a thoughtful idea like a “real beauty” campaign brings the reputation of this brand to a
higher level due to the originality and genuineness of this kind of campaign, other campaign or
other brands might want to focus on the impact of filtered selfies on female teenagers alone but
this brand decided to use the genuineness of an unfiltered picture of an individual to pass across
their point, which makes a strong point as a very original idea (Merlo et al., 2011).

Like most digital marketing, sometimes backlash can be a major challenge when a particular
audience whose thoughts is that they are not being pressure on social media and they just want to
look better for the “gram”, hence their heavily filtered picture post on the social media.

3.0 Guinness

Marketing is not in any way related to geometry, it is a dynamic concept within management
areas that puts a brand out there on the lips (and in heart) of all consumers, throwing out new
challenged and watching other rivals respond to them (Kotler, 1997). Using personal selling,
motivation and incentives to make more sales is to increase the brand’s reliability while
enforcing the buyer’s interest in the brand thereby increasing the value of the brand’s service
(Biong & Selnes, 1997).

How the campaign work

This Guinness campaign, disbursing £30m to help out pubs after the coronavirus enforced
lockdown is known as incentive marketing. this opens up a large opportunity for many pubs to
get on the Guinness train and get their share of the fund, thus bringing in more consumers of
their products. Many times a company’s sale incentive is designed to attract and keep customers,
without firstly attracting customers, there won’t be a way to satisfy them (Terho et al., 2015).
This makes campaign like this so important to brands.

Opportunities, Challenges and Impact on Brand reputation

Brand communication aims to create awareness of the band through a more favorable and strong
link with the consumers (Keller, 1998). Campaign like this sticks with every pub forever in the
consumer’s memory due to the impact it made with the funds. This keys into the part of digital
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marketing that say information stays on the internet forever and this kind of incentive will
forever be associated with the Guinness brand. The Guinness brand’s reputation will be
increased with a campaign like this, this is by adaptation of a kind of selling behaviour to
increase the consumers’ satisfaction with the product, enhancing the consumers’ anticipation of
interaction with the brand for future produce (Roman & Iacobucci, 2010).

4.0 Avatar of Prince; “the man he was destined to become”

As expressed that advertising is one of the main functions of marketing communication to the
audience (Kalam, 2020), it also need to be stablished that there are different tools in
communicating any brand to the audience. Part of the tool is sales promotion and public relation,
this is the type that was enforced in this campaign of the price and bringing him back virtually.
This type of marketing boost the reputation of such brand as it comes with other campaign. This
campaign won’t just be for major brands that sponsor (Adidas and JD Sports), this campaign also
will indirectly raise awareness for the Prince foundation that condemns knife violence.

How the campaign work

This campaign effectively made use of the hashtags, which is very effective in attraction of
audience on digital marketing. Hashtags gives audiences a better way to stumble upon brands
through topics that might interest them even without fully promoting the post or sponsoring
(Bruns & Burgess, 2011).

Opportunities, Challenges and Impact on Brand reputation

This campaign opens up opportunities on another campaign awareness, the knife law in the UK,
it is a strategic campaign which seems not to focus on the marketing but awareness which are all
part of the strategic type of marketing.

This campaign focuses on the strategic launch decisions in product commercialization. Strategic
launch decisions are the brands decision that set tones and direct the “how” of the brand being
sold and the way it will be sold (Crawford and Di Benedetto, 2008). The impact of this type of
campaign on the brands involved are very positive. The challenge associated with extending this
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type of campaign is that the focus is taken away very much from the product that was released
into the idea that came with the product being developed and what the product came to fight for.

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PART B: GUIDELINES FOR SIMILAR BRANDS IN THE FUTURE

Purpose-Based Approach to Product Ethos, Vision, Service

The internet has entered the daily lives of every individual whether he wants to accept that or
not, it has penetrated into the practice of many businesses and is a great way to interact and
commercially support brands. The internet has a major impact on the different marketing practice
(Schimdt et al., 2008). In a world where everyone looks for a purpose to their life at a certain
stage in their development, brands need to key into that purpose based approach. All the
campaigns studied above are great examples of purpose based approach to their product. They
utilise the situation of shutting down businesses of the world (Guinness – using COVID
lockdown), a murder awareness campaign (Avatar of Prince – raising more awareness to youth
purchase of knife), societal pressure (Dove – reverse selfie campaign) and saving the earth
through recycling (Sodastream – showing you care about the earth campaign).
The guidelines are advised to follow in order to come up with a purpose based approach of
marketing: -
a) Every marketing steps should begin with getting the marketing team together for original
or rebranded ideas.
b) Similar brands have to look at the situation around the present situation around the world,
the news is always filled with enough situations to look at.
c) Find a relatable situation with either the whole world or a particular target audience,
depending on the brand, what most resonate with the people.
d) Create a sponsorship for that situation and advertise both digital and through analog
means. Creating a sponsorship can include the use of a public-figure, a celebrity or in
many cases an influencer on the social media that has a large audience pull.

By following the guidelines above, instrument of marketing communication that would have
been utilised include; Advertising, Sponsorship, Public Relations, E-communication and Sales
promotion.

Communication with Audience and Stakeholders

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Communicating the approach to the audience and stakeholders is a big part of campaigns like
this, thankfully, there are brands that have done this successfully and can be used as a reference
while trying to make the stakeholders see reason for the need to join campaign like this.
Meanwhile, the audience needs something to associate all brands with. There are many brands
that engage in the same kind of services, it is only through a certain way that the brand will be
distinguished from other related ones in the mind of every audience that is out there.
An example, using the McDonald as an illustration, there are many fast food chain around the
world including burger-king and the rest of them but McDonalds will forever be associated with
the real estate idea and popularising the drive through restaurant that they included in their fast
food business and this will distinguish them from the other food companies.

Measuring the Desired Consumer Behaviour Change

Marketing managers often use target marketing and eventually break down the market into
groups, adapting some of the marketing brand communication tools as it has been established
earlier is key to any successful market strategy but in this aspect it is how to measure the
consumer behaviour change with the other success of the campaign.
Adapting the marketing elements including: products, price, mediums/channels and promotion
will suit the requirement of this, target strategy of marketing will focus on the needs and wants of
consumers (Camilleri, 2018). Marketing segmentation is a way to access the consumer
behavioural change to each and every marketing strategy that is been utilised. Targeting
advertising and other promotion activities should be directed at consumers, this can be ensured in
conjunction with an organised integrated marketing communication. Marketing segmentation
through traditional variable can be classed into five main category including demography,
psychographic, behavioural, product-related factors and geographic, through which variables are
measured. The method of promotion used, either analog or digital can be tracked for data as we
live in a data driven world (Schegg & Stangl, 2017). The establishment of data-oriented
technologies, socio data capturing and many data related digital technology can ensure every
consumer response to marketing can be tracked, both their quantitative(data) and qualitative
(reactions) can be well measured.

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Measuring the Success of the Brand’s Marketing Approach
The most effective way of measuring the success of any the approach taken is to gather
consumer feedback from the product they take, this might be done through putting a call to them
after their details has been harvested or in can come in form of a survey that can be done online
to garner response from consumers. The best way of getting a high response rate through this is
to attach an incentive to this. It can be stated on the brand’s product that they could get up to
10% off if they fill an online survey for the brand and get coupon code for their next purchase.
That is also another aspect of incentive marketing and marketing segmentation.

The four campaigns analysed above has shown an apt way through a brands’ marketing
communication. They have shown the usage of every function of marketing communication and
has put them to a great use, while adapting other branch of marketing to their campaign. To
ensure success of any marketing, utilising at least four brand marketing communication
instrument in conjunction with one another will guarantee a high success rate of the campaign. It
is not just enough to go with a branch of marketing but utilising many aspect of marketing
together in this digital age, that’s one of the few ways to guarantee success of brands.

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CONCLUSION

This report has analysed, in the first part, the function of the marketing tools employed in the
four campaign that was reviewed above. The methods, strategies and PR activities have been
explained in the body of the work. To conclude on this, there is need to smoothly integrate and
alternate between different communication tools, marketing strategies and identify the one that is
best suited to the campaign that future firms might decide to run. Every campaign is unique in its
own way and the job for us is to identify how best to communicate to the consumers.

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