1.

Introduction

According to Alison et al. (2021), brand audit helps to determine customer perspective
and interaction with the business, it also extracts insights comprised of strength and
weakness to unleash brand potential and opportunities. This report will function as a
preamble of thorough brand study of Coca Cola comprised of detailed review of the
company, goals-vision-mission, brand strategy and positioning with a thorough brand
exploratory to justify brand’s strengths and weaknesses. Lastly, a global brand
management recommendation will be included basis detailed understanding of the
business extracted by the brand. 

1.1 History of Coca Cola

1.2 Mission/ Purpose

To refresh the world. Make a difference (The Coca-Cola Company, 2022). The Coca-Cola
Company develops its business with a growth mindset, believes in continuous learning
to improve its business, evaluates the way people work, and achieves, maintains and
innovates the world on a daily basis. We are fostering a culture driven by the desire to
refresh and make a difference. (Coca-Cola Company, 2022). 

1.3 Vision

Together for a bright future, the brand has been loved and made sustainable (The Coca
Cola Company, 2022). The company's goal is to provide people with beloved brands and
beverage options so they can be physically and mentally refreshed. And it must be done
in a way that leads to a more sustainable business and a better shared future for
consumers, business partners, employees, and communities and the environment (The
CocaCola Company, 2022).

1.4 Performance

The Coca Cola Company has been growing consistently at a rate of 25% since last 10
years and pandemic year was not even an exception. The net operating revenue became
USD 33 Billion last year with a market capitalization of USD 235.9 Billion (The Coca-Cola
Company, 2022). It also distributed to 30 million retail customers last year with a
consumption of 1.9 Billion servings per day (The Coca-Cola Company, 2022). Above all,
the brand coca cola itself contributes 30% of the entire company business with a 40%
market share holding as a market leader and a revenue of USD 10 billion (The Coca-Cola
Company, 2022). Even, the newly added portfolio coke zero had a growth of 31% last
year (The Coca-Cola Company, 2022).

2. Brand Inventory

2.1 Global Branding Strategy

2.1.a. Brand Hierarchy

The packaging of brand Coke was changed for the first time and the trademark was
registered to launch its first ever advertisement on 1945 (Britannica, 2018). In the year
1982, the company first time introduced a new line under the brand coke which was
“Diet Coke”- originally named as Diet Coca Cola (Britannica, 2018). Later on, the
company kept it strategies as a House of Brands but transformed all the brands into
branded house. Coca Cola itself became the highest contributing branded house with
strong distributing network and local standardized approach. In order to achieve so,
they started forming Bottling Investment Group (BIG) in every country and started
adopting local tastes under brand hierarchy.
2.1.b. Brand Relationship Strategy

Coca Cola is considered as the master brand of the “branded house” approach for this
particular brand as it is serving as the anchoring point and all other brands e.g. Coke
Zero, Diet Coke, Flavored Coke are based on this (Earl, 2012). Because of the other
beverages e.g. Fanta, Sprite the company also possesses “house of brands” approach.
Therefore, as a whole the company is having a hybrid brand relationship approach
whereas the brand “Coca Cola” clearly has ‘branded house’ approach. Hence, it has
number of pros and cons in terms of relationship strategy are shared below.
2.2 Global Brand Positioning 

2.2.a. Brand Positioning

For building and showcasing any brand in their respective target market, companies
require a well-defined positioning plan (Hooley, 2016). Companies have to spot
distinctions to gain a competitive advantage, and they are supposed to understand their
consumer needs before providing a value to them which is their unique proposition
(Kotler, 2016). Coca-Cola as a brand stands as thirst-quenching and refreshing
(Edrawsoft, n.d.). The brand's main goal is to satisfy the target market. Coca-Cola is also
associated with enjoying daily chores with family and friends (Edrawsoft, n.d.).

2.2.b. Positioning Map

2.2.c. Points of Parity (POP) and Points of Difference (POD)

Points of Parity is the attribute of a brand which is associated with competition in the
market and can justify themselves to the customer that, they are no less than the
competition (Quey, 2021). On the other hand, Points of Difference is the unique
proposition a brand communicates to customers to prove themselves better than the
competition in the market (Quey, 2021). The key competition across the globe for Coca
Cola brand is Pepsi. However, as a brand Coke being branded house holds the highest
market share in the market worth USD 87.6 billion (Statista, 2021). The POP and POD
strategies has made this possible are discussed below in a table format.

2.3 Brand Elements 

2.3.a. Brand Identity

The above picture states that, Coca-Cola is highly adaptive and up-to-dated in terms of
visualizing their brand identity towards customer. Hence, they keep changing their, logo,
brand slogan and marketing campaign strategy which has brought them success
throughout last 135 years.

2.3.b. Target Audience

Target and Segmentation for the brand Coca-Cola varies from country to country as the
brand’s core positioning strategy is “glocal”. However, bird’s eye view of global target
marketing seems like below.

1. Gender: All (Men, Women, Trans)

2. Age: Primarily 10-25, Secondary market is 25-40 (Edrawsoft, n.d.)
3. Status: All (irrespective of income and socioeconomic class)
4. Lifestyle: More mobile and busier lifestyle
5. Positioning: Emotionally connect them with friends and family and communicating to
share Coca-Cola to celebrate happy moment and begin real magic (Coca Cola targeting
and positioning, n.d.).

3. Brand Exploratory

3.1 Brand Salience

Coke being one of the oldest brands of the world is highly reputed and mostly
penetrated household brand (The Coca-Cola Company, 2022). The brand is present
across 200+ countries since last 135 years which reassures its awareness towards
customers. According to Interbrand- the most prestigious brand awards across globe,
Coca-Cola is the 6th most popular and reliable brand (B&T Magazine, 2021).

3.2 Brand Imagery

All throughout last 135 years Coca-Cola always established the brand image for mass
people. It has established its stance as a partner of happiness, bringing joyful moments,
being social and having a lot of fun. Apart from that, it has always connected sports all
across the globe basis customers demand by nationality. In order to do so, it has always
been an integral part of biggest sports events like, Football World Cup, UEFA Euro,
Champions League, Cricket World Cup etc. In addition to that, USA being the country of
origin, it started its steps there from local market targeting customers and selling it at
nearby stores has expanded its channel to 200+ countries adopting “Glocal- globally
local” strategy. Below are the few excerpts of the campaigns and advertisements run by
Coke throughout last 135 years.

3.3 Brand Judgements

It's always been more difficult to keep clients happy and loyal enough to buy only one
brand on a regular basis in today's market. However, as the brand becomes more
attractive as a collection, customers are now increasing their loyalty (Cocacolabranding,
2016). For the customers, credibility is another important bet of judgements which
includes innovation, trustworthiness and likability. Hence, Coca-Cola always positioned
themselves as no longer just a simple drink, rather they make every moment more
special and memorable. For instances, their campaign “taste the feeling” made
customers to celebrate with friends and family which ultimately churns out to create
strong emotional bonding with proper self-respect. Thus, Coke has finally become the
most penetrated household brand and placed a strong position on customers top of
mind.

3.4 Brand Resonance

Emotional branding aims to be a long-term tool for integrating connections and deeply
touching customers who view the value of their brand as their personality. The way a
corporate brand reflects emotions not only influences the purchase decisions and
awareness of customers, but it also affects the way the corporate brand reflects actual
information about product quality (Cocacolabranding, 2016). In addition, the brand
message must be consistent and harmonious across all communication channels so that
it is aligned with the company's core values and allows customers to grow into those
who want to be unique (Cocacolabranding, 2016). With these strong brand
communication strategies, Coca-Cola is able to hold a strong customer base which has
helped them to become 6th most popular brand (vs Pepsi 29th) across the world (B&T
Magazine, 2021). This proves that, how strong resonance Coke has as a brand. In order
make it clearer and more precise, I am sharing a customer-based brand equity model of
Coca-Cola below.
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