Cocacolas Strategies to Develop In Vietnam

National Economics University Faculty of Foreign Languages The impacts of Coca Cola’s “Share a coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi Instructor: Ms Ngụy Thùy Trang Group i4 Students: Phùng Phương Mai Nguyễn Mỹ Linh Phan Ngọc Linh Ngô Quý Trung Kiên Hanoi, November 2015 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF FIGURES Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This is our research about Share a coke campaign While we made an effort to include many important problems, our viewpoint is only a subjective one It has thousands of meanings to analyze, each and every one remarkable This project could not have been accomplished without the help of some very important and special people First and foremost, we would like to express our sincere gratitude to our advisor M.A Ngụy Thùy Trang, known as the deputy Head of Business English Department for the continuous support, for her patience, motivation, and immense knowledge Her guidance helped us in all the time of research and writing of this investigation We could not have imagined having a better advisor and mentor for our study Besides our advisor, we would like to thank the friendly youth in Hanoi in general and our classmates for the enthusiasm and pleasure to help us complete the survey, for their insightful comments and encouragement, which incented us to widen our research from various perspectives Last but not least, to our own i4 team, we thank each other for the stimulating discussions, for the urgent days we were working together before deadlines, and for all the fun we have had during the course Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION Proposed Research Topic “The impacts of Coca-Cola's "Share a Coke" campaign on the youth in Hanoi” Background A – Coca Cola Company The Coca-Cola Company is the world’s largest beveragecorporation and manufacturer, retailer, and marketer of nonalcoholic beverage concentrates and syrups, which is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia Coca Cola was invented in 1886 by pharmacist John Stith Pemberton and was used as a kind of medicine before it becomes one of the most popular drinks all over the world Today, Coca Cola the Coca-Cola Company has been in business for 130 years, employs 139,600 people, and sells 1.6 billion beverages each day in more than 200 countries, with almost 500 brands ranging from the actual Coca-Cola® to products such as Sprite®, Fanta®, POWERADE®, Minute Maid®, and many, many more B – “Share a Coke” campaign Share a Coke is a debranding multi-national campaign starting in 2011 by Coca-Cola It first appeared in Australia, then spread out rapidly to Great Britain, United States and Canada in 2013, Vietnam in 2014, and many more.The word "Coca-Cola" that consumers used to see is now removed from the bottle on one sideand replaced by the phrase "Share a Coke with" followed by country's most popular names, aims to have people go out and find a bottle with their name on it, then share it with their friends and families The personalization went beyond names and included popular jargon used by the millennial demographic, including “Bestie” and “Wingman.”Users with more unusual names can custom-order a "Share a Coke" bottle with their name from the Coca-Cola Website The results were fascinating as the volume increased 4%, the sale transactions grew 3% and the Facebook traffic leap 870% Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi After the huge success of “Share a Coke” campaign, Coca Cola is making a glorious comeback in the Southeast Asia marketwith the part two of the campaign called “Share a Coke, Share a feeling” The brand puts emoticons on cans and bottles so people can share their feelings with friends.The campaign started in Vietnam Bloggers and celebrities were recruited to popularize Coke's new emoticons; partnerships with Facebook and a local messaging platform, Zalo, reinforced them As soon as the campaign starts, it has received the love from a great number of consumers, especially youngsters, who usually find it difficult to express their feelings to the ones they care about C – The youth in Hanoi The youth have always been the target customers of the Coca-Cola Company in any of its campaigns This “Share a Coke” campaign is not an exception It is the youngsters from 16 to 25 years old who consume the largest number of products and care most about the campaign They are curious, enthusiastic and eager to try original things It is undoubtedly that they are the one who contribute to the success of this original campaign Rationale Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign have finally won incredible achievements with record profits andbeen considered as pure marketing genius For this victory of the company, we notice that it would be suitable for us as economic students to attain an insight comprehension of sales through the campaign.In addition, because of enthusiasm and knowledge that students nowadays are more and more interested in business; obviously it is easy to approach this issue Therefore, we have carried out an investigation to discover the impacts of the young toward marketing strategies as well as grasp the fundamental key of succeed as potential entrepreneurs Purposes Our research aims at two respects First is to give the young an opportunity to flexibly apply all strong points of “Share a coke” campaign to our real life Besides, as NEU students, we can benefit from experiences of Coca Cola for our own businesses as well as our Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi particular positions in the economy industry Outcomes and statistics of the research are freely used for the purpose of study marketing in specific and economics in general Scope - Many researches have been conducted with the topic related to what makes “Share a Coke” campaign successful, the objective is usually customer and people who used products - The topic of our group’s research is rather different When study, we not only point out the key to Coca Cola’s success, but also focus on showing how it affects the youth in Hanoi, including their consumption behavior and their thought on the real meaning of this campaign Research Questions When deciding to conduct “Share a Coke” campaign, Coca Cola marked the youth, especially who are under 24 years old, as its target customer Besides, “Share a Coke” creates huge difference from various campaigns of Coca Cola by exploiting social network Therefore, this research’s goal is to figure out the youth’s point of view on this campaign as well as Coca Cola’s achievement through online marketing In brief, this study is going to answer main questions below: • What is the youth’s perspective on Coca Cola’s personalized bottles during and after the campaign? What is the role of viral marketing in “Share a coke” campaign? Research Methods 7.1 Qualitative Method: o Analyze books, newspapers,… related to the topic o Collect information in the internet, websites o Aim:  To have an extensive view about the success of “Share a coke” • 7.2 o campaign Quantitative Method: Carry out a survey in which 100 students in National Economics University of Vietnam will be chosen randomly to perform a questionnaire o Interview some students in Hanoi who have already engaged “Share a coke” o campaign and who have not Aim:  To have a general view of the level in which students show their  interest in the campaign To have some critical opinions about the campaign’s success and its effects on customers’ behavior via their views Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW Definitions of Marketing According to the UK’s Chartered Institute of Marketing, the term “Marketing” can be understood as “the management process responsible for identifying, anticipating and satisfying customer needs profitably” Marketing is the activity of presenting, advertising and selling a company’s products or services in the best possible way The Economists see marketing as a vital activity that “must be driven from the strategic level of a business” Marketing plan plays such an essential role in every project of every company that it is considered carefully months before the project is finally brought out into practice, as the project will definitely turn into such a disaster if the marketing plan is inappropriate for the objectives of the company The definition of Marketing may confuse people working in other fields, who want to know what marketers exactly They often equate marketing with selling, which accidentally narrows the scope of marketing Beside selling, one of the main activities of marketing is getting to know customers base on their needs and consumer habits Customers’ desire may be overlooked, or the company may provide goods and services that not match the customers’ needs This activity helps the company to build trust and strong relationship with the customers and provide goods and services that meet their requirement The essence of marketing can be summarized in three words “identifying, anticipating and satisfying” This can be seen as a progression of doing a series of researches about customers’needs at the present and predict the consumer trend in the future, then analysis the results to figure out the best way to develop their company using production material and existing resources Because of all those reasons, marketing isalways kept in mind by the corporations as the consumers’ needs are constantly changed and the company leaders have to have a flexible way to use the physical infrastructure and human resources to fulfill the requirements As marketing is a complicated matter, people may find it difficult to have the same point of view about it The definition that we have brought into this essay may not be the most exact one, but it the most relevant one to our research topic, as we want to focus on how a company’s marketing strategy becomes successful when they mainly based on the consumer habits and the way their customers think and act Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi Types of marketing Marketing is classified into over 50 types with an abundance of criterion However, we decide to focus on the five most outstanding forms for the relevance of our research To begin with, marketing mix should be listed As The Chartered Institute of Marketing (2009) refers to, it is a model that includes the 4Ps (traditionally) - Product, Price, Place and Promotion or the 7Ps (up to date) - with the supplement of People, Process and Physical evidence The second one is the original method: Traditional marketing Website Marketing schools (2012) describes it as "a rather broad category that incorporates many forms of advertising and marketing"… "that we see and hear everyday" Global marketing is another type of marketing, in which various international business allies create relationships and develop networks on a global scale CARTER (1997) did mention some viewpoints about this marketing The fourth type is possibly Multi-level marketing According to Lectlaw (2010), consumer products are generally sold by individuals either in consumer's homes or a designated area of meeting Last but not least, online marketing, known as e-marketing, is the one we mostly prefer to research on Stokes (2008) analyzes that it uses all tools through the Internet or Mobile instead of normal methods Online marketing includes an abundant of aspects to investigate into There are more than six fields in this marketing and SEO, SEM, email marketing, viral marketing, ads banner/pop-ups, multimedia or interactive advertising such as in-text/in-game and web 2.0 such as blogs or forums are assumed to be the most powerful Out of these five types, online marketing is always considered as one of the most effective ways to develop a successful marketing plan Firstly, we probably narrow down the geographical distance Partners might meet each other via computers without thinking of being far or not This allows buyers and salesmen ignore intermediary procedures Secondly, the Internet is a valuable tool for marketers to approach customers all over the world whereas others cannot almost anything Moreover, cost production, which can be reduced by 90%, will not be a burden to businesses and bring in a double effect The Role of Marketing Marketing might be one of the largest fields in the Economy It confuses people in other departments who want to know what marketers Everyone knows about the important role of marketing in business, but what it is exactly?The term “Marketing” itself seems be quite difficult to imagine, but it does have a specific function in “planning, provoking, meeting and confirming” customers’ desire for the product, service or brand the marketer is promoting Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi Marketing can help develop better products and sales presentations by carrying out researches about customers’ needs and satisfaction Marketing can also drive more customers through the front door via advertising A successful of a product or a service can be decided right after the company gets the results about the reactions of customers against the marketing strategy Beside customer service, Marketing is a link connecting companies with their customers Marketers are concerned with two criteria The first one is the purpose of it Marketing should be part of the company’s overall philosophy and vision The second one is the profit, as marketing should focus upon maximizing profitability through satisfying the customer Marketing is a business function with profit-oriented responsibilities as distinct as those of any other corporate department The marketing department’s research helps determine the right time, place, price, product features and locations to use in order to sell more of the company’s goods Professional strategies – Marketing encompasses numerous tactics to help assure that sales and profit goals are met via such specialized practices as advertising, research, public relations, promotion and pricing Factors in developing marketing strategies of a business The marketing mix has helped producers evaluate products, prices, places… Nevertheless, many factors found to affect activities in the marketing field make suppliers lose more power In her books about startup business, Collins points out five external marketing environments which are quite clear to follow Firstly, the political and regulatory environment is believed to be the origin of the whole thing Political environment includes lines and policies of the government, political structures, the system of administrations and regulatory environment consists of set of laws and regulations which may detain or bring a desired condition in marketing activities These factors powerfully dominate the foundation of commercial chances and the feasibility of accomplishing targets of any businesses Analyzing them would create an environment to easily adapt to continuous changes as well as the level of perfection and law implementation in the economy The economic environment might be the essential factors in developing marketing in any country Economic news is ceaselessly updated A small change of the economy whether Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi positive or negative might affect businesses They must notice it, evaluate its influence, and adjust marketing plans suitably Obviously, businesses flourish if the economy is soaring up, and there is no unemployment and the stability of prices Marketing products would be supported better than ever Then inflation, which raises interest rates upward and deflation as reversely, threatens the current sales forcing the businesses to reform promotional plans All in all, taking notice of any fluctuations in the markets is essential and plays a key role in maintaining the revenues and profits The competitive environment should be another potential factor to pay attention to Competition is claimed to be the motivation for the development of market economy whose rules are the winner should be the one who works more efficiently and meets consumers' demand better As competition has become more and more severe, entrepreneurs must define perfect strategies of competition to overcome their rivals and grow as much as possible If they disregard the competitive environment and its related aspects, failure is inevitable The technological problems are increasingly becoming the basic element in marketing activities Eliminating out-of-date products is considered as one function of technology It enforces corporate to create new things with unique characters Reformed techs also "transform the marketing mix" when modifying the way of advertising products The Internet, one of the most outstanding ways of e-marketing, has been the revolutionary changes helping marketers for promoting and selling a broad range of goods and services Marketers must catch up with technological advances and adjust their methods, not only to make the best of the opportunities but also to avoid potential threats The social and culture is the final aspect we want to explain about All marketing activities under any form belong to some society and each society has its own culture in its daily life Culture is related to original behaviors of humans since they were born and grew over the time Every aspect mentioned to be analyze in marketing only emphasizes on the system of values, the concept of belief, tradition and behavioral standards, which have an important impact on the formation and characteristics of markets Through analyses, companies would somehow attain the knowledge of their targets and propose a more successful plan for marketing promotion In a nutshell, while trying to find out fabulous marketing strategies for the business, it is compulsory to have an eye on external factors especially the economy, competition and 10 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi CHAPTER III: RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS After conducting the research, we have finally found out the answers for the two survey questions which were mentioned above The following analysis will help to make the data and the answers easier to understand This analysis makes the topic clearer and it will support readers all the information needed The youth’s perspective on Coca Cola’s personalized bottles during and after the campaign: As the research is conducted to find out points of view of the youth on Coca Cola’s personalized bottles, we have given out an online questionnaire to 113 people in Hanoi who are from 16 to 30 years old.The survey participants range from students, freelancers to white collars, etc and include both male and female Through carrying out the survey, we would like to understand and assess the youth’s perspective on personalized bottles of Coca Cola during and after the campaign as well as the change in their preferences 1.1 The youth’s perspective on Coca Cola’s personalized bottles during the campaign: First of all, in term of recognizing “Share a Coke” campaign, we have done this survey with 113 people including two cases The distribution among two cases can be seen in the pie chart below: Figure The percentage of interviewees who know "Share a coke" campaign Figure indicates that among all people were asked, there is surprisingly only 9.7% of them (11 people among 113 respondents) who not know about “Share a Coke” campaign of Coca Cola in comparison with the overwhelming majority of respondents (90.3%) paying attention to the campaign It is an amazing result for Coca Cola’s marketing strategy because about 90.3 percent of the young in Hanoi is such a large number Therefore, Coca Cola has efficiently introduced their personalized bottles to their target customers – the youth, and the youth seem to be highly attentive to this unique campaign However, it will be extremely unilateral if we just assess the success of a campaign through its expansion of the marketing reach To exactly figure out the level of interest among the youth, the research focuses on the time people started to concern about this campaign and their attitudes towards it afterward After collecting the information from the survey, the data presents that 50 respondents among 102 people (only 102 participants who 13 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi know about the campaign continue doing the questionnaire), about one of two respondents, have had ideas about the campaign from the very first days it was launched in June 2014 compared to just around one tenth of them have recently (three months ago) known about “Share a Coke” It is quite clear that from the initial days that Coca Cola introduced their personalized bottles, half of the youth in Hanoi has noticed its new products Figure The time the youth started to notice about the products This campaign of Coca Cola is highly appreciated thanks to not only its initial reach to a vast number of target customers but also its prevalent actions of involvement that continuously increase its recognition Indeed, some popular names are printed on personalized bottles, which had never happened before Moreover, Coca Cola also start a program which encourages customers to share personalized cokes with friends so as to connect lovers Thus, when customers first noticed about these products, they either bought a bottle with their name on it, or even introduce it to others It can be obviously seen from figure that about half of respondents tried to search a coke with their own name on it Additionally, by the action of buying a personalized bottle for friends, relatives, customers not only themselves involve in but also bring others information about the campaign This can be seen as a double hit target Then, although there are just about one of six customers bought a personalized bottle for their acquaintances, they have expanded the net of people knowing about “Share a Coke” Moreover, the data figures out that even 10 of 102 respondents did not buy a personalized bottle; they still shared their news about the campaign to others No matter how they thought about the campaign, liked or disliked, they advertised the products to others orally, which expanded the campaign’s reach It may be said that through these wise strategies, Coca Cola can indirectly market for their products Therefore, it was such a success of Coca Cola’s marketing strategy that not only sellers but also customers can promote personalized bottles Figure The consumers’ reaction when first know about the campaign Then, 66 respondents who confirmed to buy personalized bottles continued to confess about how many cokes they have bought These numbers are shown in figure From this pie chart, a portion being equal to 21.2% of respondents admitted that they have bought in the 14 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi range from to 10 bottles during the campaign, whereasthe sizeable proportion of customers confessing to buy from to bottles is nearly three times more than the number of those Even though the proportion of people consuming more than personalized bottle is small in comparison with other parts, the quantity bought could be higher than the sum of bottles consumed by people who bought from to 10 bottles From the statistics, it is evident that the sale number of personalized bottles is extremely large and as sale number is one of seven ways to assess the success of a marketing campaign, it is to say that Coca Cola has gained a huge achievement through this campaign Figure The percentage of the number of personalized Coke bottles each consumer has bough Customers’ preferences towards “Share a Coke” campaign are expressed through not only the number of products they bought but also the ways they tried to purchase their own special bottles It is such a surprising questionnaire result that about 56% of 66 people asked stated that they had tried to mess up a supermarket shelf to find a coke with their names on at least once It is generally accepted that the more effort one puts into his work, the more importance and interest level he estimates the work Trying to find a personalized bottle for themselves is not an exception Moreover, from process of interviewing, we also receive customers’ opinions in the circumstances that they had to queue one hour to purchase a special bottle Three fifth of interviewees confirmed to spend one hour to have their own personalized bottles without any complaint, but 1.5 hour is maximum Consequently, the unique marketing campaign has made such a strong impression on customers that customer did not hesitate to buy a specific product Figure The percentage of consumers trying to mess up the supermarket to find their personalized bottles Besides, to estimate the youth’s views on this campaign, we also survey about their involvements to the products through actions of sharing among 102 initial people As it can be seen obviously from the pie chart below, only about three tenth consumers was not interest in sharing a coke In other words, they believed that it was not interesting enough to take a photograph with a personalized bottle and post it onto the social network so as to share their 15 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi feelings However, the more important number here is seven tenth of customers (72 of 102 respondents)would like to share a message through their photos with the bottle Because the target survey participants of this research is the young who mostly are active to be adaptable to new trends which they can express their personality, they were willing to share their interest in some subjects to friends through several channels in the Internet such as Facebook, Instagram, SnapChat, BlogSpot and so on Besides, Coca Cola launching “Share a Coke” campaign motivates their customers to buy a personalized bottle in order to express their feeling with the one whose name is printed on the bottle Then, customers are given chances to either show their own unique item or send messages to their lovers through photos with a bottle Consequently, it is understandable that various respondents have engaged to this campaign through sharing a personalized bottle in the Internet Figure The percentage of respondents sharing their personalized bottles To exactly find out the reasons leading to the high rate of sharing a coke, respondents were asked about their motivation to introduce their bottle as well as the campaign to their friends and relatives Unsurprisingly, self-involvement is the most noticeable motivator for engagement to this campaign From the block chart below, it can be easily seen that 48 people among 72 survey participants sharing a coke have confessed that they were so excited to have their own personalized bottles that they were extremely eager to share their little happiness with lovers Then, they have chosen to share their bottled on which their own names are printed From our interview questions, we also figure out that although many people have the same name, they still felt really fancy and proud as if it was special products for them Besides, the message of sharing happiness to others is also a successful factor when it has encouraged about one of each four customers to share a coke on which name of lover is printed They can take a selfie with a bottle and write a status expressing the feeling or thought of lover in their page Moreover, when interviewing some buyers about their general idea of the campaign, some of them stated to be impressed by the way a product connecting people This was the aim of marketing directors when conducting this campaign because they wanted to warm up relationships among people 16 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi Figure Reasons for customers’ selection to share personalized bottles on social network From all the above data and analysis, we can prove that during the campaign, there are a large number of young people in Hanoi not only just buying personalized bottles but also involving to “Share a Coke” campaign This fact demonstrates the attitudes of customers towards the campaign Most of them have a deep concern about the campaign and really want to engage in the wise campaign because it gives them the feeling of being special like a famous person (when they see their name on many stores selling Coca Cola’s products) and the chance to show others about their own personalized bottles through “Share a Coke” events 1.2 The youth’s perspective on personalized bottles after the campaign and the change in their preferences for Coca Cola’s products: Although having many successful marketing strategies in the past, “Share a coke” is still a milestone of the development of Coca Cola Company This campaign had a lot of great results not only during the time it operated such as build up a reputation of Coca Cola in over 100 countries including Vietnam but also in the future The success of this milestone can be seen via the compare of the customer’s consume custom, which showed by two charts below: Figure The percentage of interviewees consume Coca Cola goods divided into five frequent levels before “Share a coke” existed This first pie chart illustrates the percentage of participants consume Coca Cola products divided into the frequent levels Overall, it can be seen that the percentage of interviewees who sometimes drink Coca Cola accounted for the majority of all participants; on the other hand, the participants who never consume Coca Cola accounted for the insignificant minority It is evident that the participant group which includes people sometimes drink Coca Cola was the highest percentage taking up about approximately a half of the survey participants, and it was followed by the figure often uses Coca Cola soft drink, at 25.5% The group usually drink Coca Cola was ranked the third place in term of the popularity, at 19.6% Other categories were much smaller Two opposite groups which is the percentage of participants always drink Coca Cola and the other one who never consume this product were only 5.9% and 2% 17 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi When “Share a coke” finished, a part of this research was operated to find out the change in consume custom of the customer after this campagaign The result was showed by the second chart below Figure The levels of changing consume custom of Coca Cola's customer after "Share a coke" campaign As it can be seen from this pie chart, consuming more Coca Cola soft drink have become the most popular choice, accounting for 68.6% of all the participants Remaining unchanged the consuming custom was the second most popular choice, with was chosen by nearly one fourth of all the customers Much smaller than the choice of consuming more Coca Cola soft drink and remaining the custom, the proportion of customers who have not bought this product since then accounted at only 7.8% compared to 68.6% and 23.5% Compare two charts, which show the difference of customer’s behavior in two separate periods, we can see how “Share a coke” campaign affect the customer’s consume custom Before this campaign, although Coca Cola have appealed for a long time in Hanoi, this kind of soft drink was not used as a frequent drink by the youth Coca Cola in a few years ago was not appealed too much in the streets or play grounds as a kind of refreshment soft drink for people At that time, Coca Cola products were just used in some special event and parties, which not happen too much in Vietnamese’s normal life Moreover, Coca Cola had to compete with PepsiCo, which is a redoubtable opponent, and many other beverage companies with variety kinds of drink Because of these reasons, nearly 50% of the participants said that they just sometime drank Coca Cola in the past However, the spread of “Share a coke” played a crucial role to introduce Coca Cola to the customers The most success of this campaign is it could change the custom of the youth in Hanoi, which is one of the most difficult works that all the marketing departments have to face when their company begins to invest in a new market These days, instead of only drank Coca Cola in some special events; this liquid refreshment was used in every meal or after sport activities and became one of the most frequent drinks of the youth in Hanoi After this campaign, 68.6% of the customers said that they have bought more Coca Cola drinks; it means that their consume custom and their point of view about Coca Cola were changed It is clear that “Share a coke” just created a bright future for Coca Cola and brought a great impression to their customers 18 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi The essential role of viral marketing in Share a coke campaign among the youth in Hanoi As far as we have studied about the behavior of the youth in part 1, there are an immense number of respondents who know about and pay attention to Share a coke campaign Then what is the key to this resounding success? Online marketing or viral marketing in specific, in which is brilliantly proposed by Coca Cola’s experts, is the main answer With the existence of advanced technologies, the approach of communication among people has gradually changed The direct contact begins to disappear and is replaced with making social friends frequently through social networks This has led to the new world of online marketing in which Coca Cola chooses to promote their products Figure 10 Ways respondents know about the campaign From data analysis in figure 1, the number respondents who know about Share a coke campaign is 102 out of 113 people, accounting mostly absolutely for about 90 percentages However, the result in figure 10 shows that the access to this campaign mainly comes from social networks where all information can be widely, effectively and fast spread Nearly 50 percent of respondents (56 people among 102 survey participants)saw posts about this campaign being shared on the Internet whereas traditional marketing such as TV, newspapers, posters or supermarkets or commercial centers, which has been a huge influence for a long time, only contributes one fourth percent to the total number This implies that the broaden effect of social network is indispensable Figure 11 Reactions of friends or acquaintances to respondents’ post with a personalized bottle Figure 12 Numbers of respondents' friends or acquaintances have shared in this campaign Furthermore, viral marketing proves itself the concept of virus Once one decides to become a part of Share a coke campaign, he will help infect other people unintentionally Then those contracted people are continuously commissioned to spread the virus as a consequence Besides the desire to share on social networks, the youth buy printed name Coke bottles which later tend to be an attractive trend and followed by others for their friends 19 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi and relationships Figure 10 and 11 points out this fact According to figure 11, each two young people are questioned about the reaction to their Facebook post about Share a coke, and then one of them would be asked again to check some information It is a surprising effect What is more, nearly 60% respondents helped Share a coke to be more popular with the number of more than friends after checking respondents' detailed things about the campaign Figure 13The reason respondents think that mostly makes this campaign successful It can be inferred from the bar chart that individualization is the most noticeable factor in the way the youth pay attention to the campaign 51% survey opinions chose to show their own style while social media affected in the little lower rate of 41.2% following with a near thing by the influence of Coca Cola brand and its special promotion This is not a required question in our survey Therefore, respondents can select up to five out of five answers and make it reliable to assess the result Coca Cola has been the winner in investigating into both the origin and the trend of social aspect in the youth The story of name-printed cans has become a historical event in marketing Coca Cola analyzes vigilantly the most outstanding characteristics of market in Vietnam They notice that the ego of Vietnamese is a remarkable point and plan to make the best use of this ego Personalizing a product is predicted as an inevitable tendency in the retail branch in 2014 As a matter of fact, customers, especially the youth, prefer to select unique items with personal style than buy some normal products They sometimes purchase those products to show off their fashion and post selfie pictures on their social accounts Marketers foresee this phenomenon and take advantages in their marketing strategies Without social networks, Share a coke has not achieved such a fabulous success Firstly introduced to the consumers in 2011, the campaign surprisinglyincreased the sales of Coca-Cola by percent Moreover, it brought about over 18 million views on media channels and the number of people accessing to the fan page after the campaign was raised to 870 percentages, an impressive figure in comparison with the number before When this campaign was implemented in Vietnam from 2014, it received the similar wonderful result On 9, June 2014, Coca-Cola posted on its fan page to announce the campaign and it gained more than 190,000 likes, 8,000 comments and 1,000 shares 20 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi Coca-Cola created the hash tag #xomtu to encourage people to attach to their posts the personalized Coke The hashtag helped spreading brand awareness throughout social media platforms, not only for “Share a Coke” campaign but also for thereafter activities or campaigns The post to promote the second stage of the “Share a Coke” campaign in which Coca-Cola introduces Coke with familiar and funny adjective to describe personality also attained more than 30.000 likes The promotion activities for Share a Coke also get support from Vietnamese well-known celebrities They post the photos showing their name Cokes and even motivate their fans, mainly are the young people, to engage to the campaign Their posts attract greatly their huge number of fans in Facebook After expanding effect, Coca-Cola products have been spent on more and more and consolidated their powerful trademark All in all, the company has temporarily dominated their competitors in beverage market as well as worn out other substitute goods due to successful applications of viral marketing 21 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi CHAPTER IV: CONCLUSION Summary Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” has become one of the greatest advertising campaigns in the history of beverage industry all over the world Its products have been noticed since the very first days of the campaign and “Share a Coke” has gradually developed till it reaches its glorious success There are many factors that lead to “Share a Coke” campaign’s huge victory By doing this research, we have figure out that pointing out the target customers and caring about their thought and desire are one of the most important key to success In other words, it is the individualization that helps Coca-Cola gains their achievement Coca-Cola knows their customers best, thus creates such a wise and unique campaign that gains attentions from a great number of the youth in Hanoi from the beginning of it The brilliant idea of personalizing the Coke bottles by printing popular names on them instead of the word “CocaCola” has attracted millions of youngsters who are curious and eager to have new and interesting experience or those who want to assert themselves by having something that shows their own personalities As enthusiastic and energetic people, they don’t mind spend time searching for their own bottles, especially when people they know have already had theirs, even if they have to mess up the whole supermarket or queuing for such a long time to have someone print the personalized bottles for them In addition to that, personalized bottles are perfect gifts for the ones they love as they imply a wonderful message in each bottle Furthermore, youngsters are well-informative, as they not only buy and share their bottles, but also recommend the products to others By doing this, they have gradually become an amazing and vital part of the advertising campaign Moreover, the attractiveness of the campaign has changed the consumer behavior as youngsters are now getting familiar with Coca-Cola products, which is the greatest success – the long-term achievement Above and beyond, viral marketing also plays an essential part in “Share a Coke” campaign’s success This can be seen obviously as the youth mostly know about this campaign through the Internet, especially the social network Internet has become the most powerful and convenient tools of news spreading in recent years Taking this as an advantage, Coca-Cola uses Internet as one of their main methods of advertising beside social media It is proved in the study that sharing the photos of personalized bottles or information about the 22 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi campaign through the social network such as Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr is the fastest and the most efficient way to bring “Share a Coke” to the youth, not to mention that it does not cost any money or time and effort of the company, as consumers promote the product themselves Implications As the students studying at National Economics University, we find it extremely important and useful studying from the success of people and companies all over the world Thus, we carry out this research with the hope of sharing a lesson about success of such a famous company as Coca-Cola with all the students who cares about economics like us We can benefit from experiences of Coca Cola for our own businesses as well as our particular positions in the economy industry Outcomes and statistics of the research are freely used for the purpose of study marketing in specific and economics in general Moreover, we expect the young to take this study as an opportunity to apply the lesson in our real life Limitation Everyone can be Coca-Cola’s consumers, regardless of age, gender, living condition, etc However, the participants we would like to research about are Coca-Cola’s target customers – the youth in Hanoi Moreover, there are multiple marketing factors that build the campaign’s success Within this study, we can only concentrate on the reaction of consumers to “Share a Coke” and the effect of the online marketing factor on the success of the campaign, which are two factors that we personally think that are the most essential ones Further discussion The success of a project is formed by many different factors Marketing strategy is only one of them There are still questions about the keys that lead to the triumph of “Share a Coke” advertising campaign It is highly recommended for all of us to figure out more about other factors that create a successful business as it will be really helpful to our future careers and our real life 23 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi REFERENCES CARTER, S (1997) Global Agricultural Marketing Management Food And Agriculture Organization Of The United Nations.Rome: FAO Regional Office for Africa CHRON (2012) ways to evaluate your marketing plan [Online] Available form: http://smallbusiness.chron.com/7-ways-evaluate-marketing-plan-58331.html [Accessed: 11th October 2015] COLLINS, K (2012) Exploring Business.[Online] 2nd Ed Available from: https://open.umn.edu/opentextbooks/ [Accessed: 10th October 2015] LECTLAW (2010) Tips On… Multi- Level Marketing [Online] Available from: http://www.lectlaw.com/files/cos67.htm [Accessed: 7th October 2015] MARKETING SCHOOLS (2012) Traditional Marketing [Online] Available from: http://www.marketing-schools.org/types-of-marketing/traditional-marketing.html [Accessed: 7th October 2015] PATRICK MURPHY (2014) The Role of Marketing [Online] Available from: http://www.business2community.com/marketing/role-marketing- 0797941#LZPQiOEmJ5gS8Ely.97 [Accessed: 10th October 2015] STOKES, R (2008) EMarketing: The Essential Guide To Online Marketing 2nd Ed South Africa: Quirk eMarketing (Pty) THE CHARTERED INSTITUTE OF MARKETING (2009) Marketing And The 7s [Online] Available from: www.cim.co.uk/files/7ps.pdf [Accessed: 10th October 2015] THE PAPER F1/FAB EXAMINING TEAM (2015) The role of Marketing [Online] Available from: http://www.accaglobal.com/gb/en/student/exam-support- resources/fundamentals-exams-study-resources/f1/technical-articles/the-role-ofmarketing.html [Accessed: 10th October2015] 24 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi APPENDIX Questionnaire: “Share a Coke” is Coca Cola’s latest advertising campaign launched in June 2014 which encourages customers to seek and purchase bottles and cans with their names on them In order to get a full attention from customers, the campaign’s name has been translated to suit Vietnamese market, into: “Trao Coca Cola, kết nối bạn bè” This survey questionnaire is designed for the project on the success of Coca Cola's above advertising campaign Your assistance in responding to these following questions is highly appreciated In completing these questions please choose the answer that you find right by ticking in the box before each answer Do you know about “Share a Coke” campaign? (113 respondents) □ Yes □ No Before the existence of this campaign, how often did you use Coca Cola’s soft drink bottles? (102 respondents) □ Never □ Sometimes □ Often □ Usually  Always When did you know about this campaign? (102 respondents) □ About3 months ago □ About6 months ago □ About year ago □ From its beginning in Vietnam How did you know about “Share a Coke” campaign? (102 respondents) □ I saw these personalized bottlesoffline □ I saw its advertisement on TV, newspapers, posters, etc □ I saw posts about this campaign being shared on the Internet (Facebook, Instagram, …) □ Someone gave me a personalized bottle as a gift □ Others What did you after you knew about this campaign? (102 respondents) □ I bought a bottle with my own name on it □ I bought a personalized bottle to give it as a gift □ I told others about this campaign but I did not buy a coke □ I did nothing How many personalized bottlesyou have bought? (66 respondents who tick st or 2nd answers in question 5) 25 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi □0 □1–5 □ – 10 □ More than 10 You tried to mess up a supermarket shelf to find a coke with your name on at least once Agree or disagree? (66 respondents) □ Agree □ Disagree Did you share a coke (sending messages through personalized bottles)? (102 respondents) If the answer is yes, go to question and 10; if not, go to question 11 □ Yes □ No What was your main reason to share? (72 respondents who tick yes in question 8) □ Because Coca Cola is my favorite drink, and I wanted to share it with others □ BecauseI was so interested in a bottle with my name on that I wanted to show it to everyone □ Because I just wanted to follow the trend □ Because I wanted the receiver know I was thinking of him and shared my feeling with him □ Other 10 How did your friends respond to your post with a personalized bottle? (72 respondents) □ They did not pay attention □ They justliked my post □ They liked my post and ask me some information about my personalized bottle □ Others 11 How many friends or acquaintances of yours have shared in this campaign? (102 respondents) □0 □1–3 □4–6 □ More than 12 Since when have you lost your interest in this campaign? (102 respondents) □ Afterhaving my own personalized bottle □ After posting a photo with a personalized bottle on the Internet □ After failing to buy a Coke with my own name □ After observing this campaign and gradually finding it not interesting enough □ Others 13 When this campaign is over, will you still consume Coca Cola? (102 respondents) □ Yes, I will consume more Coca Cola than I did before this campaign □ Yes, I will but I think that the number of Coca Cola cokes I buy does not change much □ No, I will not 14 Choose the reason that you think that mostly makes this campaign successful? (102 respondents) □ Individualization (making coke a beverage belonging to people who have their names printed on it) □ Successful use of social media as a way of advertising □ Coca Cola is already one of the most favorite soft drink in Vietnam so no matter how they advertise, they still succeed 26 Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi □ It is a unique and wise campaign □ It exploits efficiently herd-mentality 15 If this campaign were operated by other companies, would you participate? (102 respondents) □ Yes □ No Interview questions:  How you feel when you see your name appears on a large Coca Cola screen or       advertising board in a crowed street? Supposing there is no social-network existence, which means that you cannot share your coke widely, what would be your attitude toward "Share a Coke" campaign? Beside social networks, what are the sources of information you use to know about “Share a Coke”? Are you willing to waiting for more than hour queuing in front of Coca Cola kiosks to have your own unique coke? Why/ Why not? After experiencing this campaign, which brand would you choose as your frequent softdrinks? In your point of view, what is the main difference in taste between Pepsi and Coca Cola? Can you distinguish between them? What is your general impression of this campaign? 27 [...]... origin and the trend of social aspect in the youth The story of name-printed cans has become a historical event in marketing Coca Cola analyzes vigilantly the most outstanding characteristics of market in Vietnam They notice that the ego of Vietnamese is a remarkable point and plan to make the best use of this ego Personalizing a product is predicted as an inevitable tendency in the retail branch in. .. are active to be adaptable to new trends which they can express their personality, they were willing to share their interest in some subjects to friends through several channels in the Internet such as Facebook, Instagram, SnapChat, BlogSpot and so on Besides, Coca Cola launching “Share a Coke” campaign motivates their customers to buy a personalized bottle in order to express their feeling with the...Research Topic: The impacts of Coca-Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign on the youth in Hanoi technological advances These are the elements marketers might assess carefully because they all are indispensable in bringing in sales and profits for the company 5 Factors in evaluating a marketing plan Marketing plan plays an indispensable role in conducting promotion for a product The success of a marketing plan... survey opinions chose to show their own style while social media affected in the little lower rate of 41.2% following with a near thing by the influence of Coca Cola brand and its special promotion This is not a required question in our survey Therefore, respondents can select up to five out of five answers and make it reliable to assess the result Coca Cola has been the winner in investigating into both... played a crucial role to introduce Coca Cola to the customers The most success of this campaign is it could change the custom of the youth in Hanoi, which is one of the most difficult works that all the marketing departments have to face when their company begins to invest in a new market These days, instead of only drank Coca Cola in some special events; this liquid refreshment was used in every meal or... [Accessed: 7th October 2015] 5 MARKETING SCHOOLS (2012) Traditional Marketing [Online] Available from: http://www.marketing-schools.org/types-of-marketing/traditional-marketing.html [Accessed: 7th October 2015] 6 PATRICK MURPHY (2014) The Role of Marketing [Online] Available from: http://www.business2community.com/marketing/role-marketing- 7 0797941#LZPQiOEmJ5gS8Ely.97 [Accessed: 10th October 2015] STOKES, R... interviewing, we also receive customers’ opinions in the circumstances that they had to queue one hour to purchase a special bottle Three fifth of interviewees confirmed to spend one hour to have their own personalized bottles without any complaint, but 1.5 hour is maximum Consequently, the unique marketing campaign has made such a strong impression on customers that customer did not hesitate to buy... Remaining unchanged the consuming custom was the second most popular choice, with was chosen by nearly one fourth of all the customers Much smaller than the choice of consuming more Coca Cola soft drink and remaining the custom, the proportion of customers who have not bought this product since then accounted at only 7.8% compared to 68.6% and 23.5% Compare two charts, which show the difference of customer’s... beginning of it The brilliant idea of personalizing the Coke bottles by printing popular names on them instead of the word “CocaCola” has attracted millions of youngsters who are curious and eager to have new and interesting experience or those who want to assert themselves by having something that shows their own personalities As enthusiastic and energetic people, they don’t mind spend time searching... campaign through the Internet, especially the social network Internet has become the most powerful and convenient tools of news spreading in recent years Taking this as an advantage, Coca-Cola uses Internet as one of their main methods of advertising beside social media It is proved in the study that sharing the photos of personalized bottles or information about the 22 Research Topic: The impacts of