Title	RAISING THE CHRISTMAS SPIRIT BY USING SPOTIFY’S LISTENING DATA
Brand	COCA-COLA
Product/Service	COCA-COLA
Category	E06. Use of Music Streaming Platform or Video Hosting Service
Entrant	ISOBAR FINLAND Helsinki, FINLAND
Idea Creation	ISOBAR FINLAND Helsinki, FINLAND
Idea Creation 2	CARAT Helsinki, FINLAND
Idea Creation 3	MKTG Helsinki, FINLAND
Media Placement	CARAT Helsinki, FINLAND
Production	ISOBAR FINLAND Helsinki, FINLAND
Production 2	MKTG Helsinki, FINLAND
Additional Company	SPOTIFY Stockholm, SWEDEN

Name	Company	Position
Jaakko Koskinen	Isobar Finland	Creative Director
Jussi Hakanen	Isobar Finland	Creative Strategist
Oona Müller	Isobar Finland	Creative Planner
Markus Pirilä	Isobar Finland	Producer
Marko Virta	Isobar Finland	Graphic Designer
Janne Asikainen	Isobar Finland	Video Creative
Anssi Saresvuo	Carat Finland	Media Strategist
Noora Peitsara	Carat Finland	Client Director
Anni Silamo	MKTG Finland	Senior Client Director
Kati Myllykangas	MKTG Finland	Producer
Tanja Tammisalo	iProspect	Specialist, Paid Marketing
Paula Pihlajaoja	MKTG Finland	Graphic Designer
Janne Honkaniemi	Spotify	Account Director
Marcus Winberg	Spotify	Creative Solutions Manager
Eeva Ronkainen	Spotify	Account Director

Why is this work relevant for Entertainment?

Music plays a big part in raising one’s Christmas spirit. In a unique collaboration between Coca-Cola and Spotify, we leveraged this bond in a campaign where the amount of Christmas music streamed on specific Spotify playlists determined which Finnish city would be granted the ultimate gift: a visit from the beloved Coca-Cola Christmas truck. We also used streaming data from Spotify to extract local Finnish listening habits regarding Christmas music and used the insights to create a full-fledged campaign that kicked off the Christmas celebrations throughout Finland.

Background

In 2019, the Coca-Cola Christmas Truck was going to tour around Finland for the second time ever. The debut tour the previous year had already been a success, but now Coca-Cola wanted to strengthen the brand’s ownership on Christmas by making this year’s campaign extra special. Our brief was to ramp up interest towards the Christmas Truck tour – to make it seem as alluring as the inaugural tour. The last stop on the tour itinerary was left open and instead of just picking the logistically suitable city to fill it, we were asked to use this opportunity to find a creative solution that would bring extra hype for the whole tour. Our business objective was to increase Coca-Cola’s brand equity and drive consumption in the core target group, teens of age 13 to 19.

Describe the creative idea

As the last stop of the tour itinerary was open, our idea was to have five Finnish cities compete against each other to determine who would receive a visit from the Coca-Cola Christmas Truck. As full believers on the emotional power of music, and thus cooperating with Spotify, we chose the competition mechanism to be based on the amount of Christmas tunes streamed per city. Whoever would start raising the city’s collective Christmas spirit through music the most, would be granted a visit from the Coca-Cola Christmas Truck. To support the competition, we used streaming data provided by Spotify, to create PR angles and content for social media based on the regional Christmas music streaming habits. The collaboration marked also a global first for Spotify, as their streaming data was used in a completely new way to engage listeners on and off the platform together with another brand.

Describe the strategy

Coca-Cola has a long history of using music as part of their iconic marketing – just say the words “Holidays are coming” and see if a melody appears in your mind. In order to leverage the importance of music into the Finnish Christmas Truck campaign, Coca-Cola decided to dig in deeper with help from Spotify. On Coca-Cola’s request, Spotify looked back into the streaming data from the previous Christmas which showed that the bond Finns have with Christmas music is strong. According to the listening habits, Finns start listening to Christmas songs really, really early, already in November, way earlier than most countries. The strategy was to strengthen the link between Coca-Cola and Christmas by activating Finns to begin streaming Christmas music in a Coke-branded environment, thus prolonging the festive season and increasing the sales of Coca-Cola.

Describe the execution

Coca-Cola Finland created a brand profile on Spotify and curated five city-specific playlists full of local and global Christmas classics. Starting in mid-November 2019 and by using targeted messaging on Spotify and other social media platforms, the people of the regions were driven to listen to their playlist and at the end, the city with the most followed playlist received a visit from the Christmas Truck. The campaign also included a complete take-over of the Spotify experience in audio, banners, other sponsored playlists and home page takeover placements. The streaming data also provided the campaign with regional insight pin-pointing differences between cities in terms of top artists and songs. This gave fodder for local PR and social media assets that played a big part in tuning minds into the Christmas spirit.

Describe the outcome

The campaign delivered in all aspects, by driving consumer engagement, building key brand metrics and delivering solid sales and market share growth. Business results (compared to year before) Results from Nielsen Homescan: • House-hold penetration: +2.2 ppt CokeTM Brand metrics (Teens 13-19, compared to year before) • For Someone Like Me +19 % • Brand I Love +15 % • Great Tasting +38 % Thousands of Spotify users followed the city-specific playlists and the amount of streams rose to the levels of the most popular featured playlists on Spotify’s home page. The event held in the winning city, Forssa, turned out to be the most successful of the whole tour as almost 30 % of the whole population of the city turned up. The campaign was also picked up by multiple national news outlets with over 100 media hits.