Pepsi Reaches out to Digital People in Analog

Really innovative way of getting the word out! The new cans don’t look like Pepsi to me, though. They remind me of an energy drink or some kind of tea drink.

I think they would have been better of going for a more vintage look than a futuristic type logo. They are a recognized American brand and they should stick to their classic look.

I think they would have been better of going for a more vintage look than a futuristic type logo. They are a recognized American brand and they should stick to their classic look.

Chris, wanted to give my opinion on why I’d give this a C+ rather than an A, for one very simple reason (as far as I can see from what everyone has posted)

Pepsi designed cool packaging, targeted just 25 influencers, staged an elaborate multi-delivery fedex stunt and then ….

…sent the same impersonal form letter to every one of the 25, from what I can see on all the Flickr photos. They didn’t get to know their intended targets well enough to write just 25 personal letters? No contact details other than a friendfeed room? You don’t know the name of the person who sent them, their email address, their phone address, their skype? no business card? No written signature?

This is really a rookie mistake. Influencer Outreach 101 – don’t spam, take time to know your target and pitch them personally. Or else it’s not the beginning of a conversation, it’s just an old fashioned direct mail, with a friendfeed url at the bottom.

Don’t be dazzled by the big brand name. This is very underwhelming.

Pepsi clearly employs a tiered engagement strategy with bloggers. When I was working for a huge brand I ran a very similar program with great success. By looking at keyword traffic you can see that while their may be millions of conversations online about your brand generated by hundreds of thousands of people, the primary social traffic is generated by a select few – in Pepsi’s case, my guess is 25 people are responsible for kicking off over 75% of the conversation they were looking to start. I was working with similar numbers of people who started and influenced up to 10 million conversations each month. So, as you mentioned, their strategy worked… they sent you something intriguing and made you feel special for getting it, you wrote because you had something to say about it (and it’s always nice to have an exclusive/early piece on something), people tracked back and others linked to those secondary articles… etc. Next step for them is being a part of the conversation they’ve created – don’t have any evidence that they’re tracking or getting involved so that remains to be seen. First step in running a smart social strategy though… check.

Pepsi clearly employs a tiered engagement strategy with bloggers. When I was working for a huge brand I ran a very similar program with great success. By looking at keyword traffic you can see that while their may be millions of conversations online about your brand generated by hundreds of thousands of people, the primary social traffic is generated by a select few – in Pepsi’s case, my guess is 25 people are responsible for kicking off over 75% of the conversation they were looking to start. I was working with similar numbers of people who started and influenced up to 10 million conversations each month. So, as you mentioned, their strategy worked… they sent you something intriguing and made you feel special for getting it, you wrote because you had something to say about it (and it’s always nice to have an exclusive/early piece on something), people tracked back and others linked to those secondary articles… etc. Next step for them is being a part of the conversation they’ve created – don’t have any evidence that they’re tracking or getting involved so that remains to be seen. First step in running a smart social strategy though… check.