Why Coke gave out over N330m to consumers… artisans, jobless benefit

When you take a look at the carbonated soft drink market in Nigeria, what picture do you see?

It is an interesting segment of the fast moving consumer goods, FMCG market. Carbonated soft drink is all about refreshment and that is the market the Coca Cola has played very well in the last 126 years. It is a very viable category that meets the needs of consumers. Often times, the consumers need refreshing drink that keep them where they want to be.

Do you see the market accommodating more entrants?

I cannot comment on what other people will decide to do or whether there will be new comers and products, but I can confidently say that the range of Coke brands and flavours would always offer something special and unique to consumers.

Coke enjoys top brand image globally, but recently you introduced ‘Open Happiness’ promo, what was the objective?

It a campaign for the Coca Cola brand. We launched the Under the Crown Promo called open and win consumer promo. The whole idea behind the promo is that Coke stands for happiness and in everything we do, Coke desires to spread happiness to all its consumers. That was why we launched the promotion to spread happiness on the faces of Nigerians.

Again, we realised that times are hard and we wanted to give back to our consumers and reward them for drinking Coca Cola.

You gave out N70m of N1m each to 70 people. Do you think you have really rewarded consumers, considering your large consumer base?

I would say, yes. That is consumer promotion. Beyond the N1 million prize, there were loads of airtime for mobile phones. Everyday, we gave out thousands of airtime in different denominations, ranging from N100 to N1,000.

Yes, we produced 70 millionaires. We gave out airtime because key to mobile phone is airtime. We also believed that the airtime will make the consumers happy to make them keep talking and sharing happiness. The winners cut across the social strata. We have seen undergraduates, graduates, traders, artisans, young professionals, civil servants.

Reward through promos has become a norm among companies, is promo the only tool to reward consumers?

I don’t think it is the only channel to reward consumers. I really know that a lot of brands and companies run consumer promos. But we as Coca Cola reward consumers and other key stakeholders. From time to time, we run trade discount incentives where we give our dealers discounts on stocks. We may not make noise about it but we realise that dealers are key in business. There are other ways of rewarding consumers, but the noise about promos has tended to overshadow other schemes.

When you assess the Coca Cola recent promo, what lessons do you learn?

There were positive comments. I had the privilege of calling one of the winners who just lost his accommodation and has no money to rent another house. On the phone, he was so excited about it. When you listen to such stories and the impact the promo has had on consumers, you will be touched and feel happy that you really impacted the lives of people.

What gives me joy is that the people who won the cash are those who mostly needed it and this is joyful to any brand manager that his brand is touching the lives of people. We had winners from all over the country. The expectations were high among consumers, but we were happy with the promo. We used SMS system to connect with the consumers because it was to easily reach the consumers.

From research, we wanted a way we could make entry into the promotion as easy, seamless as possible. With phone, the airtime came to winners easily. On the lessons, the partnership with the network was a good one and because of the promotion, we generated a lot of traffic on the networks.

Which winner of the N1m prize touched you most?

A lot of them were touching. The phone call I made to the guy that lost his accommodation really touched me. He was almost in tears and said that this was a prayer that was answered directly by God. The first three people were also excited over the winning.

Is there any mechanism by Coca Cola to ensure winners manage their many well?

No. We did not put any mechanism in place. Our role was to give out the prizes. What we did was off the line advice to them to spend their money well. It is a gift from the company. It is like how we earn our salaries where employers don’t dictate to us on how we spend our money.

There are Coke variants in other countries that are not in Nigeria, do you have plans to bring some variants here?

Coca Cola as a company sees innovation as key to its business because we want to remain connected to the consumers, and we listen to our consumers through the extensive research. The Coca Cola Company has over 400 brands to its name in over 200 flavours. For flavours or brands that are relevant to our consumers, we will definitely consider bringing them in. For instance, consumers like Limca and they want it on the go and we launched Limca on PET.

What factors do you consider most important when attempting to influence consumer?

Since we are a soft drink business, the key need we fulfill is quenching the thirst and experience the pleasure the brand gives you. We present our brands in a way our consumer appreciates. Everything starts from research and listen to what consumer says and why they say it. We understand their desires and need of their consumption, so we always look at ways to connect to them to ensure they understand us.