Situation:

Coca-Cola is an official sponsor of the Swedish national teams in football. They wanted to make a stand for gender equality during the women’s world cup in 2019.

Brief:

Create an idea that showed Coca-Cola's stance on the importance of gender equality within the sport and in general.

Objectives:

Make the issue of gender equality a natural part of the news reporting during the women’s world cup and place Coca-Cola front and center of the debate.

During last year's World Cup, Coca-Cola wanted to show its engagement on gender equality in Swedish football. To do so, Coca-Cola turned four top players of the women’s national team, Hedvig Lindahl, Kosovare Asllani, Caroline Seger and Nilla Fischer, into symbols for equality in Sweden. The first female players in Sweden to have a statue raised in their honor. The Football Forevher initiative gained major national and international attention and became the topic of conversation in Sweden during the World Cup.

Swedish football is far from an equal playing field and research shows that one key factor is the lack of visibility for female players: if women aren’t visible or marketed as stars they will never be recognized as stars. In Sweden, female athletes only account for 20% of media coverage.

The campaign’s key message was the importance of visibility for female players and naturally, the players were pinpointed as our main spokespersons and assets for the campaign. We also worked with a researcher within sports and gender to give further insights into the issue and be able to re-set the agenda gender equality agenda.

To engage both football fans and key stakeholders, we couldn’t solely bet on traditional media, we needed to create engagement on social media too. Hence, we planned social media assets and listed relevant influencers, opinion-makers, and politicians we could leverage and share info and assets with.

We only had access to the players ahead of the championship, so we had to strategically use those opportunities to get as much earned attention as possible

First beat:

Mid May

Embargoed player interviews about the initiative with national media

May 29

Wide media announcement and launch in Coca-Cola, the player’s and The Swedish football association’s social media channels.

Second beat:

May 31

Regional media covers from Gamla Ullevi, when the statues are being shown to the public for the first time and photoshoot for social media with the players next to their statues.

Third beat:

July

Local media is engaged when the statues arrive at the player’s hometowns.

Coca-Cola attends the political event Almedalen and holds public viewings and panels to talk about the initiative.

We create tips on how fans can contribute to increased visibility, which are sent to and widely shared by players, influencers, opinion-makers, and politicians.

-The initiative generated 650 articles in national and international press

-96% positive sentiment in media

-Reach, earned social media: 12 000 000

-Total reach globally: 145 000 000

-Exceeding the goal with 1570%

-The transaction driver resulting in more than 150 000 codes redeemed to the benefit of youth football. Codes redeemed: 150 000 (+112% vs 2018)

-The spontaneous brand awareness increased 7.9 percentage points to 55.4%

-Spontaneous Brand Awareness: +7.9 ppt to 55.4% (12-59 years)

-Brand Love Score: +8.3% (12-59 years)

-”Coca-Cola Zero Sugar: +15% vs PY