Is Diet Coke giving its UK and EMEA business to Ogilvy a win or a defend? After all Ogilvy owner WPP supposedly enjoys a binding relationship with The Coca-Cola Company to handle all its marketing and even formed a new agency Open X to do so. Although that didn’t stop Coke moving its media (probably the most valuable part of the business) to Publicis a couple of years ago or, reportedly, inviting Uncommon and Mother (among others) to pitch for Diet Coke.
So are such all-encompassing agency/client relationships worth the contract they’re written on or, at best, just a sign that you get first dibs at a new piece of business? Often they fail to last beyond a change of client anyway although Ogilvy did manage to hang on to IBM for a pretty impressive 32 years before declining a repitch this year, although IBM is no longer the big, consumer-facing account of yore.
Diet Coke’s a funny one, on this side of the pond anyway. As an advertiser it comes and goes, sometimes to effect. This time the emphasis is on social and influencer marketing we read, which may be a disappointment to the ex-adam&eve team of James Murphy, Tammy Einav and David Golding now running Ogilvy following the purchase of New Commercial Arts. The three love impactful advertising with a light touch, as instanced with the agency’s new work for Dulux.
Diet Coke is a great brand that deserves some great advertising. Let’s hope Coca-Cola doesn’t get completely carried away by the siren voices of influencers and others.
