Pepsi Campaign and Brand Awareness

Pepsi a soft drink manufactured by PepsiCo was first introduced in 1898 (Hoover, 2002), and has grown to be a leading global brand as a carbonated soft drink. Pepsi continues to be the leading icon of this Foods and Beverage Company. To strategically position itself against its rival competitor Coca-cola, Pepsi has had to undertake major and very expensive campaigns. In light of this, this paper outlines the campaign objectives of Pepsi brand in creating brand awareness, image improvement and interest among its consumers.
This paper will also outline the cost implications and budget required in realizations of these objectives. One of the objectives of Pepsi has been to increase its global brand awareness and reach more consumers. Pepsi acquired the services of Arnell group, a company specializing in brand creation and product innovation to help uplift its brand image globally. By visiting different countries to explore emerging markets and global product drivers, the company has been able to get the purchase intentions of its consumers. Its youthful consumers needed a brand that is fun and brings the aspect of adventure.
With the goal of increasing its global market, Pepsi ventured in a different campaign strategy. By leaving the TV program super bowl to launch the Pepsi refresh program, the campaign would be instrumental in increasing its brand awareness globally. Apart from being a global promotional strategy, the $20 million program will push the Pepsi image higher because it identifies programs that Pepsi would fund in local communities worldwide (Warren, 2010). Another objective of Pepsi is to identify itself with the aspirations of its target customers.

Pepsi has defined its target market as the youth and has come up with campaigns such as the 1963 “you are the Pepsi generation” (Romanik, 2007). By having a variety in packaging of the soft drink, Pepsi has captured the youth who are adventurous and like variety. Also by contracting musician such as Britney Spears to promote Pepsi, the soft drink has been able to associate itself and develop interest among the youth . As Mike Doyle the creative director at Arnell group says “Pepsi speaks to the youth in their language” Through the Pepsi refresh program which is also philanthropic, Pepsi has objective of making the world a better place.
By choosing viable and needy projects to fund spending an amount of $20 million pepsi will be making the world a better place to live in (Warren, 2010). This campaign raises global awareness of pepsi as a brand and cultivates a good attitude of the customers to the brand. Marketing communications as cited in Czinkota & Ronkainen (1998, p. 360), is the manner in which a firm makes an attempt to remind, inform or persuade consumers-directly on their brand. With reference to social media campaigns which should partake the marketing costs of an organization, the estimated cost depends on what needs to be done and how much the firm can afford.
The range availed for an ad campaign goes to about $5,000 to $250,000,000. Looking at the PR campaign, it can cost $2,500 to $100,000 per month depending on the overall marketing budget, the tactics employed and how much money is being redirected to a specific target market. A typical budget would also incorporate social media postings, landing page generation as well as analysis and other miscellaneous costs that need to be accounted for (Khera-Communications, 1998). Referring to Pepsi refresh project, the total cost of the campaign was about $20 million (Warren, 2010).
The best budget method for this campaign would be the zero-based budget method. This type of budgeting allocates no funds unless each activity to be funded is justified fully without regarding the previous budget. This type of budgeting would account for every cent to be spent on the campaign. Unlike what would happen in the traditional budgeting, this method would not consider past campaigns that have been undertaken. Each campaign would be treated unique with money and other resources allocated according to needs and the expected benefits of the campaign as outlined by the relevant managers.
One advantage of this budgeting method is the minimization of wastage and allocation of funds based on the needs of the campaign. When blind-taste tests were conducted between Pepsi and the coke of Coca-cola, consumers would choose Pepsi as the better tasting drink. This indicates that with the right campaign Pepsi would enjoy a bigger market share as opposed to today when Coca-cola soft drink outweighs it globally. This type of campaign with a global reach would be very effective in creating brand awareness and improving the image of Pepsi worldwide.
References: Hoover, G. (2002). Hoover’s Handbook of American Business. Austin: Hoover’s, Incorporated. Khera-Communications. (1998). Sample marketing plan. Retrieved May 26, 2010, from http://www. ignitesocialmedia. com/what-should-a-social-media-marketing-campaign-cost/ Romanik, R. (2007). pepsi Global Strategy. Retrieved May 26, 2010, from http://article. unipack. ru/eng/18573/ Warren, C. (2010). Pepsi to Skip Super Bowl Ads in Favor of $20M Social Media Campaign. Retrieved May 25, 2010, from http://mashable. com/2009/12/23/pepsi-super-bowl/