Tailored consumer experience is now the major focus of Coca-Cola as the brand focuses on personalisation in the digital marketplace. As the rising tide of e-tailers and food service partners such as Just Eat and UberEats dominate the Food and Beverage Industry, Coca-Cola’s agenda is to strengthen the brands foothold by adapting their marketing approach from commercialised to individualistic. Over the past 21 months the brand engaged in experimental technological advances, one in which gave rise to the new direct-to-consumer (DTC) ecommerce marketplace, yourcoca-cola.co.uk which allows customers to order Coca-Cola products directly to their homes. The brand had to create new and innovative methods to adapt to the changing world due to lockdown last year, with customers migrating to online channels of service. Yourcoca-cola.co.uk is already growing with the options to create personalised cans, build product bundles and set up a subscription for regular delivers.
Chief marketers’ fears circulate within the industry that creativity has been stunted by remote working. The post-lockdown climate, a hybrid working model is the new norm although CMOs fear that less time in the office is negatively impacting creativity. A study by LinkedIn (completed by 1,304 C-Level executives), finds that 58% of senior marketers believe that social ties are not as strong between team members as most have never meet before. The issue is that remote-working flexibility, will be a permanent fixture in the professional world but with that there could be a strain on interpersonal relationships and comfortability to express ideas and generate creativity. Alternatively, 76% of CMOs accept that flexible working has encouraged young talent and greatly improved employee diversity which has increased creativity with fresh perspectives. Major organisations are still in the experimentation phase of discovering the work/life balance that allows both parties to thrive. Employers must listen and adapt to grow with the changing world around them to achieve success.
