Coca-Cola's Brand Equity: Real-Time Reputation Tracking

How Coca-Cola Further Enhanced its Brand Equity through Real-Time Reputation Tracking
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How Coca-Cola Further Enhanced its Brand Equity through Real-Time Reputation Tracking
It is always interesting how some brands have a loyal consumer following and remain at the top of the food chain despite facing continued competition from new and incumbent rivals. One such company is Coca-Cola. According to Forbes 2020 ranking, Coca-Cola is the 6th most valuable brand in the world with a brand value of $ 64.4 billion and the most valuable beverage brand in the world (Forbes, 2020). This has not been by chance; it has remained one of the most recognized brands in the world because of the global brand equity it has built and effectively managed for years.
Coca-Cola is well known for the unique taste of its beverages and unique marketing campaigns that have garnered a loyal customer base. It has also focused on engaging with its customers on social media through powerful marketing campaigns such as Share a Coke, among others, and listens to what its customers want and responds appropriately. According to Steenkamp (2017), Coca-Cola believes that its success lies in how its customers feel and think about the brand. Specifically, Coca-Cola believes that if its customers were to forget everything they know, feel, or think about Coca-Cola, the brand would not survive. As such, it is focused on social listening by collecting data on social media to identify what customers are saying about the brand and what they want from the brand.
For instance, they listened and responded to consumers during the Share a Coke campaign which allowed it to personalize its products. The Share a Coke marketing campaign focused on printing names on the coke bottle to allow consumers to enjoy a customized bottle of coke (Coca-Cola, n.d.; WBR Insights, 2022). However, there were not enough names in Coca-Cola’s database and soon enough, consumers went on to social media to complain about their inability to find a Coca-Cola beverage with their name printed on it. Coca-Cola was able to capture these real-time comments about its brand and responded by expanding its database by including new names submitted by consumers ordering personalized coke beverages.
This is an indication of how Coca-Cola uses real-time tracking to collect data on consumers’ sentiments about the brand through brand mentions on different social media platforms, and more specifically, Twitter, to enhance its brand equity and reputation. According to Rust et al. (2021), real-time tracking allows companies to monitor consumers’ sentiments about the bran...