It's all in the name...

When I was growing up, if I ever wanted to buy branded clothes to try and fit in with the other kids at school (and let’s face it, a flamboyant, lanky, goofy kid with big wavy hair isn’t the easiest thing to try and make blend in) my mum would tell me that I was only paying for the name. It seems like Coca-Cola have taken the words of my mother - and many other mums out there – and decided to make money out of it in their latest advertising campaign.

The ‘Share a Coke with…’ campaign has been brilliant yet infuriating at the same time. I won’t lie, I felt like a bit of an eejit in our local Co-op sifting through all the bottles trying desperately to find my name! But, when I found my name, the joy and satisfaction I felt was akin to finding Long John Silver’s lost treasure

The basis of the campaign is connection; our way of communicating with each other has changed considerably over the past decade, even with the people we consider ourselves close to. With the worlds of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and all the various other social media sites very much a part of our everyday lives, do we actually take time to see people face-to-face anymore? No? Well, find a bottle with your friends name on and go and share a coke with them!

As with every modern campaign, it’s been backed up by T.V. adverts, print ads, bus backs (every time I see the double decker bus go by sporting a bottle of coke with my name on it I feel a little bit special) and it’s own micro-site on their website where you can find out if your name is on a bottle or not. And if it turns out your name isn’t available, you can create a cyber can so you don’t feel left out.

Whoever came up with the simple idea of putting peoples names on the side of a can of soft drink deserves a pat on the back. And they’ve taught us an important lesson; a campaign doesn’t need to be overly complicated to be massively effective!

So, it appears that (as she always tells me) Mummy really was right; it’s all about the name - although this time it’s about MY name, not a brand name!
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to root through the local chiller cabinets to find some bottles of Dan!

Dan

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