Pepsi comeback scores

"By beginning the decisive round of the South African Cola Wars at this point, Pepsi was able to integrate its sponsorships of individual soccer stars competing in the Soccer World Cup into its mobile marketing campaign," said Lesli Bilgor of tbsp///beyond-the-line, the advertising agency tasked with managing elements of Pepsi's return to South Africa after a nine-year absence.

20 Jul 2006

The mobile marketing applications developed by Cellsmart Technologies, a wireless application service provider (WASP), for the "Fest" promotion as part of Pepsi Cola's launch into South Africa have seen response rates almost triple in three weeks.

The concept behind Pepsi's Fest promotion was developed by tbsp.

Cellsmart integrated mobile content and applications into the Pepsi MyDaDaDa WAP portal enabling the downloading of video clips of players, picture messages and the popular Pepsi MyDaDaDa ringtone.

"This is the first time in South Africa that a WAP portal has been integrated into a company's overall marketing strategy. It takes mobile marketing away from simple bulk SMS applications and onto a whole new level," said Ahmed Kajee, Managing Director of Cellsmart Technologies.

To access the content and applications developed by Cellsmart, cellular users SMS the word 'Pepsi' to 33022 at a cost of R1.50 per SMS. A WAP link is sent to users' cellphones via SMS. Users simply choose the 'fetch' option to be instantly connected to the MyDaDaDa.com WAP portal.

"Pepsi is turning to mobile marketing as an attempt to involve young people in the brand experience. Cellsmart is thrilled to have delivered on Pepsi's mobile marketing campaign in South Africa because the ideas developed here could be transferred to Pepsi's other operations worldwide.

"The choice of WASP is the kind of choice that could make or break a campaign. Reliable connectivity should be offered to all three South African networks so that communication with the mobile client base is never interrupted. The WASP's connectivity agreements with the networks should also allow it to either limit or expand the technology embedded into the campaign," concluded Kajee.