Coca-Cola: Sprite Thirst for Yours

 

Campaign Summary

Sprite partnered with UPROXX to create a production team out of unsigned hip-hop creators providing them with opportunities, guidance, and a platform to amplify their work to help get them the recognition they deserved.

Strategy

Objective and Context:

African American youth are the most important consumer group for Sprite in respect to long-term growth. The company recognized that as relevance among African American youth declines, overall sales decline in the following years. Thus, Sprite's strategic objective was to increase its brand relevance among African American youth. Partnering with entertainment and pop culture website UPROXX, Sprite moved to engage young African Americans through the power of hip-hop. The company leveraged UPROXX's unique resources and connections in culture to help elevate today's young creators, by giving them the guidance, tools, and the platform to catapult their talents to the next level.

In 2019, Sprite and UPROXX recognized that there was an issue in the music video industry. Only artists were getting the credit and shine for the work. But it takes an entire production team to make a project successful, with many behind-the-scenes roles. For a new generation of creatives, collaboration and attribution of credit is essential. So, Sprite decided to embark on a journey to redefine how the music video industry worked in the 21st century. It established the "Thirst For Yours" project (TFY), the first ever crowd sourced music video production crew that elevated emerging talent and gave them the credit they deserved for their hard work.

The multi-platform concept not only identified emerging talent, but also gave them the resources to create, partnered them with industry leaders to mentor them, and amplified the work. Moreover, Sprite captured the entire behind the scenes process and shared it with its massive audience, to elevate the Sprite Crew to an all new level.

Target Audience:

Sprite's core audience were creators within hip-hop culture. Creative self-expression is their passion, be it through music, fashion, or art. They are also keenly aware of what's going on in culture and have a sense of responsibility to bring positive change to their community. However, their talents and voices are not always discovered or heard.

Creative Strategy:

Sprite executed custom videos and banners on social and native channels with additional social amplification, a sponsored editorial sponsorship package to generated more awareness for the custom components of the campaign. These assets ran on desktop and mobile platforms.

Execution

Overall Campaign Execution:

Sprite launched a call-to-action on social media with a swipe up link to a splash page for artists' submissions that enabled it to further vet talent. It leveraged existing social media platforms and technology to usurp existing systems of gatekeeping all in an effort to elevate and support emerging hip-hop talent.

Mobile Execution:

In order to discover the most talented emerging artists to be part of the first of its kind production crew, Sprite launched a social-first call-to-action campaign across social platforms. The social campaign targeted young creators and drove them to a splash page where they could apply to be part of the crew. This social-first CTA did away with the typical hierarchical gatekeepers of the music industry and allowed for Sprite to discover and then elevate emerging artists directly. While not everyone has industry connections, most people have access to a smartphone which in turn opened the doors to create with some of the industry's most prolific hip-hop creators.

Additional campaign elements included:

  • Call to Action: Sprite's CTA was used to discover 10 crowd-sourced crew members resulting in hundreds of submissions from emerging hip-hip creators.
  • Sprite Way House: Sprite brought the team of 10 and Sprite Way artists, its community of unsigned musicians, to a creative workspace in Los Angeles filled with resources to bring their vision to life.
  • Industry Mentors: Sprite introduced the crew to renowned industry experts such as Big Sean's director, Nipsey Hustle's producer, and Talib Kweli's makeup artist.
  • Profile Videos: UPROXX produced short-form social videos on behalf of Sprite, profiling each individual emerging artist highlighting that hip-hop is about community, not just solo artists.
  • Behind-the-Scenes Documentary: Sprite created a 10-minute documentary that captured the entire behind-the-scenes process from day one when everyone met each other for the first time, all the way through the execution of the music video.
  • Social Amplification: Sprite rolled out a teaser of the music video, the documentary, and profile videos across UPROXX and Sprite's social channels to drive awareness and excitement. Industry experts posted the music video, and BET aired the video on national TV. The resounding impact of making a crowdsourced music video with emerging artists reverberated throughout hip-hop culture.
  • Music Video: Sprite distributed the final music video that the TFY crew created on YouTube, UPROXX.com, and its social channels.
  • Screening Party: Sprite screened the documentary and music video at a launch party in down-town Los Angeles, creating a cultural moment.

Results (including context, evaluation, and market impact)

This campaign garnered 23 million social impressions, 69 million digital impressions and over 3.5 million video views. It also reached 15.2 million people. This reach provided awareness, attention, and opportunities to those who participated in the project that they otherwise would not be able to receive. By highlighting each member of the team through social and editorial profiles, everyone who worked on the project, including Sprite Way Artist Moxie Knox, were able to promote themselves within their industry and open up more opportunities.


Categories: | Industries: | Objectives: Brand Awareness | Awards: X Finalist

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