Follow the Money; Social Media Spend Shifts

So, No Pepsi at the 2010 Superbowl! Wow, what do you think about that?

As reported by the good folks at Mashable;

For the first time in 23 years, Pepsi will not have any ads in the Super Bowl. Instead, the company will be spending $20 million on a social media campaign it’s calling The Pepsi Refresh Project.

Such a large move is noteworthy for any company, however Pepsi’s symbiotic relationship with the Super Bowl makes this shift to new media that much more seismic. ABC News notes that Pepsi spent $142 million on Super Bowl ads over the last decade. Pepsi’s ads are often some of the most iconic, and the company has historically pulled out all the stops for the Super Bowl.

We believe that The Directional Flow of Marketing Has Changed If you are following what the big brands are doing, it is pretty clear that they are waning from traditional marketing more and more in favor of Social Media Marketing.

Will they find the payoff?

Well, that has yet to be seen.  But one thing that we are seeing with Social Media Marketing, both from our own experiences with our small business and what others are doing that isn’t talked about is that it is largely about Marketing Within. What we are seeing is that many times the most successful social media marketing campaigns are about the brands customers.

Compound Effect

We penned a post a year or so ago over on Search Engine Guide about the Compound Effects of Social Media Marketing, and received almost sixty comments. The point of the post though can be seen in what Pepsi is doing.

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This is an interesting strategy, especially for a company that continues to spend much of its advertising budget on television. Like other social media campaigns, execution is key. If Pepsi can effectively orchestrate the Pepsi Refresh Project, the company can build brand awareness while also helping out communities across the world. On the flip side, if not executed properly, the company could wind up spending $20 million on philanthropic causes (which is to be commended), without getting the benefits of a buzz-generating ad campaign.

So, an opportunity to create brand Awareness AND Philanthropic Causes sure seems to be an excellent leverage of marketing dollars. This will be an interesting experiment to watch.