U.S. brands are increasingly going to market with social purpose and corresponding creative platforms that form the foundation of branded entertainment narratives.

In the United States, branded entertainment has become a common tactical approach to reaching younger audiences in a fragmented media landscape where traditional ad formats are often viewed as an interruption.

As digital media outlets have grown into dominant branches of major media outlets, branded entertainment has become a key revenue source for the majority. As a result, an ever-higher portion of digital content is branded entertainment. Yet it’s often not identified as such by younger target audiences who have grown up with it.

Last holiday season, Coke Zero gave mankind the world’s first tool for creating a completely customized tacky holiday sweater: the Coke Zero Sweater Generator.

Over the course of two weeks, we asked tacky sweater masterminds to unleash their inner grandmothers and design the ultimate holiday sweater on our microsite. Every sweater element - the cut, color, pattern, icons and even background - was completely customizable to accurately reflect a person’s true sweater spirit. On December 1, the top 100-voted sweaters were carefully handcrafted by loving machines and shipped to their loving creators, just in time for the tacky sweater holiday season.

In a 12-hour period, the activation generated 12 million impressions and added 1,400 new Twitter followers to Coke Zero’s account. A promoted Twitter post announcing the program generated over 40,000 impressions at a CPE of $0.49, three times more efficient than the projected $1.50 CPE.

Ultimately, 38 portraits were completed from 173 entries with over 700 total engagements on Mother’s Day.