China’s digital commerce economy represents 32% of all online buyers around the globe and 55% of all sales online. Digital payment is 11 times bigger than in North America, 50% of users are under the age of 30, and there are more than 16 million food delivery orders fulfilled daily.

Chinese food delivery apps enjoy about 200+ million monthly active users. On average users spend about 14 minutes on their preferred food application per day and are recorded to access their app on average 6 times per day.

In response to this dynamic environment, Coca-Cola China set an ambitious target to increase online sales through personalised consumer experiences.

To keep up with the rapid demands of near-instantaneous decision making required of marketers during 11.11, Coca-Cola built a War Room: A new working methodology involving a transparent supply of real-time dynamic data and analytics. By centralizing the campaign metrics and data, and combining this with segment profiling - including likes, dislikes, product views and shopping behaviours - the team were able to better understand what strategies were working with each of the five consumer layers – from targeting through to purchasing.

By truly knowing our consumers, we were able to instantly optimize their targeting strategies for each consumer layer, from keyword banner and SEO copy iteration adjustments to social content.

We then supplemented this with dynamic purchasing deals that were targeted for each unique consumer layer – from discount percentages to bundle deals including beverages from the wider Coca-Cola family, including Sprite and the Schweppes Group.

As a final step, Coca-Cola re-targeted any customers who had viewed the product or added products to the basket, but had yet to follow through on purchase. In the post-launch stage of the campaign, we were also able to re-target consumers who had made successful purchases, encouraging them to re-purchase, building brand loyalty.

In order to activate real-time insights and make smarter decisions, we developed a data strategy primed for building direct-to-consumer relationships.

Project MARS focused on four key integrated pillars optimized in real-time:

Mobile: We invested heavily in mobile, creating the first-ever dedicated SKUs to cater for online shoppers seeking a new kind of experience. From Peach, to lemon or vanilla – we enabled fans to order new flavours of Coca-Cola online and customize their bottles with stickers.

Analytics: Harnessing e-commerce RTB media tools on China’s two biggest platforms, JD and Tmall, we built a logic chain that allowed us to precisely target five unique consumer layers. Releasing multiple banners during the 11-11 campaign period, we succeeded in reaching each layer with distinct touch points and offers.

Real-time: Unleashing the power of real-time data, we created a War Room to track sales and media data by the second, ensuring that the team could optimize performance, strategy and communications to keep up with the rapid pace of the 11.11 festival.

Social: Turning to social, we created an array of culturally-connected celebrity content and scaled this with influencers to show consumers that when Coca-Cola is part of your life, you can’t beat the feeling.

During 2018’s Single’s Day (11.11), e-commerce giant Alibaba generated US$ 30.8 billion worth of sales in just 24 hours.

Similarly impressive, Project MARS exceeded all KPI’s to deliver 4X greater e-commerce sales (vs. 2017) and delivered a positive ROI, even during the most expensive online media period of the year.

MARS made large gains off its successful 6.18 campaign, further optimizing media efficiencies:

Project MARS’s smarter targeting increased click rate by +269%

We increased our conversion rate by +145%

And increased ROI by +56%

Smashing last year’s sales records on China’s two largest e-commerce platforms:

Doubled 2017’s sales on JD.com

Surpassed 2017’s sales by 1.5x on Tmall

And ranked as the number 1 top-selling sparkling beverage during the festival.