MARKETING MIX OF COCA COLA

Marketing decisions generally fall into the following controllable categories:

Product
Price
position
Place (distribution)
Promotion

PRODUCT STRATEGY OF COCA COLA
Product: Anything that can be offered to a market for attention, acquisition, use or
consumption that might satisfy a want or need.

LEVELS OF COKE AS A PRODUCT

CORE PRODUCT
Core benefit is that it fulfills the thirst.

ACTUAL PRODUCT
Design: Pet bottles, returnable glass bottles, economy packs.
Quality: Quality differs with respect to country for example. Coca-Cola Can quality that
is available in Middle East is certainly different as compared to Coke Can available in Pakistan.

PRODUCT CLASSIFICATIONS
Coke is categorized as a convenience product, because the purchasing rate is very high
and this is the product that is bought very frequently.
INDIVIDUAL PRODUCT DECISIONS











BRANDING

BRAND EQUITY
As far as coke is concerned brand equity for the customers is very high. People are highly
brand loyal.

BRAND STRATEGY
The following is the brand strategy of Coke

LINE EXTENSION
Line extension occurs when a company introduces additional items in a given product
category under the same brand name. For example if Coke introduces new flavors and package
size, it will be considered as line extension.

Brand





Product

Existing


New


Existing


Line extension

Brand extension

New


Multi-Branding

New brands

BRAND EXTENSION
Brand extension means using a successful brand name lets say Coca-Cola and then launching
new product for example cherry coke. This was an example of brand extension.

MULTI-BRANDING
It means introducing additional brands in the same category. For example Coca-Cola not
only introduced coke as a brand but also sprite and Fanta.

DIVERSIFICATION
It means introducing new product with the new brand name. It means diversification but this
is something Coca-Cola has not adopted for as yet.

PRODUCT LINE DECISIONS

PRODUCT LINE LENGTH
It means the number of products that company is offering. For example Coke, Diet Coke,
Fanta, Sprite etc.

PRODUCT LINE FILLING
Product line filling means that earlier when Coca-Cola started it had only one flavor of
coke available and that is classic coke but with the passage of time company filled the product
line by adding diet coke, diet lemon etc.




PRICING STRATEGY OF COCA COLA
The amount of money charged for a product or service, or sum of the values that
consumers exchange for the benefits of having or using the product or services. As price gives us
the profit so this P is very important for business price of product should be that which gives
maximum benefit to the company and which gives maximum satisfaction to the customer.
Following factors Coca Cola kept in mind while determining the pricing strategy.
Price should be set according to the product demand of public.
Price should be that which gives the company maximum revenue.
Price should not be too low or too high than the price competitor is charging from
their customers otherwise nobody will buy your product.
Price must be keeping the view of your target market.
The price of Coca Cola, despite being market leader is the same as that of its competitor
Pepsi Cola. Sometimes, Pepsi places its customers into some psychological pricing strategies by
reducing a high priced bottle and consumers think that they save a lot of money from this.
PRICES OF DIFFERENT BOTTLES
Size of Coca Cola Price of Coca Cola (RS.)
Regular bottle 12
Non returnable or disposable bottle 25
1.5 liter bottle 60
2.25 liter bottle 70
Coca Cola can 30


PRICING STRATEGIES

COMPETITION BASED PRICING APPROACH
Coca Cola has intense competition with Pepsi so its pricing cant exceed too much nor decrease
too much as compared to the price of Pepsi Cola. If price of the Coca Cola exceed too much
from the Pepsi then people will shift to the Pepsi Cola and on the other hand if the price of Coca
Cola decreases people might get the impression that its quality is also low.
PROMOTIONAL PRICING POLICY
Coca Cola has offered promotional prices very frequently. Especially on some occasion
Coca Cola reduces its rates like in Ramzan Coca Cola reduces its rate unto 5 Rupees on 1.5 liter
bottle.
MARKET PENETRATION PRICING POLICY
Prices in beverage industry are determined by the consumer. In an economy like that of
Pakistan, consumers tend to switch towards a low priced product. Coca Colas objective is to
target every consumer of the country so Coca Cola has to set its prices at such a level which no
one can offer to its consumers. That is why Coca Cola charges the same prices as are being
charged by its competitors. Otherwise, consumers may go for Pepsi Cola in case of availability
of Coca Cola at relatively high price.


DISCOUNTS
Coca Cola offers various discounts to those retailers who have the maximum sales of
Coca Cola products on daily, monthly and on seasonal basis. Some of the main discounts given
to the retailers are as follows:

QUALITY DISCOUNT
Following are discounts offered by Coca Cola.
1/10 DISCOUNT
I.e. one case of Coca Cola is free on buying 10 cases of Coca Cola at one time.
2/20 DISCOUNT
I.e. two cases of Coca Cola are free on buying 20 cases of Coca Cola at one time.


SEASONAL DISCOUNT
Following are discounts offered by Coca Cola.
Coca Cola also offers seasonal discounts schemes by reducing price in Ramadan and on
Eid. Coca Cola also offers trade in allowance for retailers.
3 B F DISCOUNT
I.e. sometimes, especially in the off-season duration, in order to increase the sale of Fanta
and Sprite, 3-BF discount is given (i.e.) 3 bottles free on purchasing every case of Fanta and
Sprite.
INCENTIVES
Mainly two types of incentives are given by the Coca Cola:
INCENTIVE TO RETAILERS
Coca Cola provide various incentives to retailers on the best sales and achieving the
predetermined sales targets. These incentives are in the shape of:
Deep Freezers
Return Tickets
Free Transportation Services.
INCENTIVE TO DEALERS
The first, second and third best dealers of the year are awarded.

CREDIT
There is no credit system in the beverage industry. Every single bottle is sold on the cash
basis.


SPECIAL OFFERS
Coca Cola gives special offers to consumers on special occasions like Ramadan and Eid
days instead of decreasing the price of the products, some special packs like Pakkora Mix, Chat
Massala, or Free Drinks with Liter Bottles are offered.




POSITIONING STRATEGY

The way the product is defined by consumers on important attributes, the place the
product occupies in consumer minds relative to competing products.

Price


More

Same

Less



Benefits

More







Same






Less



Here if we talk about more price and more benefits, we can discuss Coca Cola and Pepsi.
As both are the market leaders and 90% market share of Pakistan beverage industry is secure by
them & the rest 10% is secure by the rest.
And we can also take Coca Cola and Pepsi as challenger for each other as both of them
provides more for same, more for less & same for less. As they are giving their customers more
benefits for same price and also more benefits for less price with respect to different packaging
sizes.
Others colas like Mecca Cola, Amrat Cola and Mountain Dew are offering same for same
price and same benefits for more price. They are using followers strategy, as they follow the
other market leaders and giving their customers same benefits for same price. Others colas like
tha bottles (local colas) are offering less benefits for same price and less benefits for less price.
As they have no existence in market and their products have no position or we can say very
badly positioned in consumer minds.

LOGO OF COCA COLA
Logo is what establishes a brand name in the consumer mind. It is the brands identify,
signature, image and more often it is a logo that makes of breaks a product logo plays a very
effective role to improve the product or brand. Coca Colas kept on changing its logo from time to
time along with the trade marks.


PACKAGING & LABELING OF COCACOLA
Packaging means the activities of designing and producing the container or wrapper for a
product.
Traditionally packaging decisions where based primarily on cost and production factors,
the primary function of the package was to contain and protect the product the product. In recent
time, however humorous factors have made packaging an important marketing tool. These
factors include all acting attention describing the product making the sales.
Packaging involves designing and producing the container or wrapper for product. The
package may include the products primary container a secondary package that is thrown away
when the product is about to be used and shipping package necessary to store , information
appearing the product labeling printed information appearing on or with the packaging is also
part of packaging. Label ways rouge from toys attached from product to the complex graphic that
identify the product or brand, such as the product the label weight also described several things
about the product that made its contents how it is to be used.
Coca-Cola products, almost all of them are available in bottles of 250 ml, 500 ml pet jar,
1000ml, 1500 ml and 2000 ml bottles as well as 330 ml cans.
The advantages of packaging are as follows
In strip packaging there is aluminum foil on both the sides. Strip packing is done
for providing stability to those products which are having less productivity.
In facilitating branding and advertising of products.
In serving as a silent salesman. It induces the buyers to make re order.
It has got display value.
It helps the seller to increase his sales and obtained higher prices than he could get
from unpacked good.
Printed literature containing Instruction to use the product can be easily passed
on to the consumers by putting in the package.
Packaging given the product a prestige an individually and identity which the
goods sold in loose form do.

LABELING OF COCA COLA
Labels may range from simple tags attached to products to complex graphics that are part of
the package.
Labeling is mainly done in order to promote the product through attractive graphic. In the
Coca-Cola company, the labels are provided with bottles.



PROMOTION STRATEGIES OF COCA COLA

GETTING SHELVES
They get or purchase shelves in big departmental stores and display their products in
those shelves in that style which show their product clearer and more attractive for the
consumers.

EYE CATCHING POSITION
Salesman of the Coca Cola Company positions their freezers and their products in eye-
catching positions. Normally they keep their freezers near the entrance of the stores.

SALE PROMOTION
Company also do sponsorships with different college and schools cafes and sponsors
their sports events and other extra curriculum activities for getting market share.

UTC SCHEME
UTC mean under the crown scheme, coca cola often do this type of scheme and they
offer very handy prizes in it. Like once they offer bicycles, caps, TV sets, cash prizes etc. This
scheme is very much popular among children.


DISTRIBUTION CHANNELS

Coca Cola Company makes two types of selling
Direct selling
Indirect selling


DIRECT SELLING
In direct selling they supply their products in shops by using their own transports. They
have almost 450 vehicles to supply their bottles. In this type of selling company have more profit
margin.

INDIRECT SELLING
They have their whole sellers and agencies to cover all area. Because it is very difficult
for them to cover all area of Pakistan by their own so they have so many whole sellers and
agencies to assure their customers for availability of Coca Cola products.

FACILITATING THE PRODUCT BY
INFRASTRUCTURE
For providing their product in good manner company has provided infrastructure these
includes:
Vizi cooler
Freezers
Display racks
Free empty bottles and shells for bottles
ADVERTISEMENT OF COCA COLA

The field of advertisement is one area where Coca-Cola has always emphasized.
In year 2000 Coca-Cola unveiled the biggest advertising billboards in the history of
Pakistan. Each unveiling was marked by entertainment and light shows watched by thousands of
people. Similarly in July 2000 Coca-Cola launched its first under the crown promotion by the
name of Dream Vacations in which the consumers could collect caps of promotional bottles of
Coca-Cola like Sprite, Fanta and Coke.

ADVERTISEMENT OBJECTIVE
Type of advertising with respect to product life cycle that Coca-Cola adopts is reminder
type. The reason behind this fact is that coke is such a product that is at the maturity level
currently so for such a product companies mostly go for reminder type of advertisement so that
they can penetrate more and more and same is the case with Coke.

SETTING OF ADVERTISING BUDGET
Coca-Cola sets its advertisement budget on the basis of competitor based budgeting.
Major competitor of Coca Cola is Pepsi and as Coke realizes that Pepsi has increased its
advertising budget, straight away Coca-Cola management plans to do the same so that they can
compete in advertising department as well.

ADVERTISING STRATEGY
Before creating advertising message the Coca-Cola Company gives lots of time to the
factor that the message must gain customer attention. This is basically called Clutter Buster
means that only that advertisement will leave impact on customer mind that has some specialty
or uniqueness in it. For example in India Coke current slogan Thanda Matlab Coca-Cola has
gained reasonable customer attention.


ADVERTISEMENT MEDIA
Coca-Cola Company advertises its products mainly coke through electronic media that
includes Television, Radio and Internet as well. Moreover leading newspapers of Pakistan are
also the targeted by coke for advertising. So we can say that coke not only uses electronic but
print media for advertisement as well.
Coca Cola Company use different mediums
Print media
Pos material
TV commercial
Billboards and holdings

PRINT MEDIA
They often use print media for advertisement. They have a separate department for print
media.

POS MATERIAL
POS material mean point of sale material this includes: posters and stickers that are
displayed in the stores and in different areas.

TV COMMERCIALS
As everybody know that TV is a most common entertaining medium so TV commercials
are one of the most attractive way of doing advertisement. So Coca Cola Company does regular
TV commercials on different channels.

BILLBOARDS AND HOLDINGS
Coca Cola is very much conscious about their billboards and holdings. They have so
many sites in different locations for their billboards.