Can you explain the strategy behind this move?
Ashley Brown: We published Journey as a print, internal-only magazine from 1987-1997. Our CEO and chairman Muhtar Kent asked us to bring Journey back in a digital format, but the more we thought about that challenge, we realised that we shouldn’t keep these great stories behind the four walls of Coke.
We believe we’re the first brand to pull down a traditional corporate website, really question what the role of a company site should be and replace it with an interactive magazine focused on real content. It’s a risk and we expect to make mistakes, but I’m excited to see what the future holds and how our readers respond.
Companies are now taking digital communications to a new level. How important is it that the soft drinks industry embraces online and digital marketing?
Ashley Brown: I believe that it’s crucial that we embrace online communication and engagement. When Coca-Cola Journey readers give us their time, it’s incumbent on us to ensure they get something out of the time they share with us, whether that’s telling them something they didn’t know, inspiring them to learn more, or making it easy for them to make a difference in the world in some way.
How will The Coca-Cola Company develop/evolve its social media and online marketing tools looking to 2013?
Ashley Brown: I don’t want to give away too much, but I think you can expect to see us focus even more on rich, real content experiences and bringing our owned media channels – web and social – together in an increasingly cohesive and integrated way with our earned media programme.
What do you believe to be the most exciting aspect of the new site?
Ashley Brown: I really love our remained Brands pages. We spent a lot of time thinking about what a brand page on a magazine should look like. When I joined Coke, one of my frustrations was trying to find all of our social presences. So, from the very beginning, we wanted to really showcase the brands’ real-time, engaging communications. That’s their social channels, and we wanted to make it easy for the people to follow them. My second favourite feature is ‘dim’ (go to any article and click ‘dim’ in the upper right).
Ashley Brown is director, digital communications and social media at The Coca-Cola Company.
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