Branding & Advertising

Phase : 1

Abdullah Majeed

Bilal Tahir

Fareeha Ejaz

Muhammad Haroon

MBA II - A
Facebook

Pepsi Sting is currently advertising on social media through Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

As we could see that the number of posts per month is around 8 to 10 posts. This figure should

be increased as respected competitors in the beverages industry are posting 6 to 7 posts per day.

Hence the value is not enough to reach the maximum user base. Mainly when they are focusing

only on organic reach, we could see a drastic change in the number of likes and comments in

several posts. The fluctuation in number dictates that those posts with a higher engagement rate

had some budget spending attached to it. These posts were paid. As seen below:
When we click to Ads & Info on the page, it demonstrates that currently, they do not have any

paid campaign on Facebook running. They have been inactive in several months like January and

October. To maintain an excellent organic reach, they will have to be regular in their postings

and should create some engagement like competitions where people engage other users. This will

not only increase the brand awareness but the likes for the overall page.
Instagram
When we move towards Instagram, we could see that the posts were the same. They are using

the same posts for all three mediums and with the same caption. This led to lower engaging

numbers. The number of followers on Instagram is just 5000 while on Facebook they have a

huge fan base of over 440,000. This change in followers has led to a decreasing comment and

liked ratio on Instagram.

Twitter
Moving towards Twitter, they are unable to utilize twitter due to lack of hashtags. They should

attach several more hashtags like for Multan – one punch challenge can contain #Multan in their

posts. This will increase the chances of the post being seen to people of Multan and others who

are searching for something about Multan on twitter. Hence, the campaign strategy and

execution is critical in which Sting is currently lacking. The posts look similar, and they are

creating any novelty in the posts. All the posts are video and picture posts while they can also

use Carousel to show the benefits of having Sting, or why consumers should buy Sting as they

have gotten heavy criticism recently.

Celebrity Endorsements
Sting has been actively involved in celebrity endorsements. Their recent campaign of “Life ka

switch on” has been executed by using actor and model Emad Irfani. Apart from this the brand is

also endorsed by world famous boxer Amir Khan for their “Sting Boxing Challenge Campaign”
Out of Home Advertisements

This is a mobile phone charging booth placed at Emporium Mall Lahore where people can

charge their phones when they are out of battery. This is a very interesting concept to reinforce

the brand’s core message of power and energy to people.

For in store marketing Sting has come up with digital gondola shelves place at Alfatah stores in

Lahore.

Boxing Challenge by Sting at Packages Mall Lahore.

Analysis of TVCs and Youtube videos

With 10,769 subscribers, Sting’s official youtube channel has 12 videos. Below an

analysis of all the videos will be given. Figure 6 shows a screen shot of Sting youtube channel.

The first video is “Sting Catapult”. This is a 13 second video with 151,000 views posted

9 months ago. It had 17 likes and 4 dislikes and 2 comments saying “…” and “mera channel sub

kero”. The video has a man on an Island who launches himself like a catapult between two palm

trees as a plan flies by doing aerial advertising that states “life ka switch on hai”. Below is a
screenshot of the video in figure 1. The second video is catapult 2; it is a short version of the

same video with 1800 views and has a 7 second duration. Both the ads are animated.

The third video is similar to the first two but have actual actors and actresses in it. Emaad

Irfani is the main character. The name of the video is Sting #LifeKaSwitchOn. The video has

18,975 views, 100 likes, 51 dislikes, and 13 comments saying negative statements. The video

starts with Emaad running after an actress who goes on a ship and forgets her bag (that Emaad

has). He drinks sting and starts sparking and thinks about what to do and launches himself like a

catapult with two palm trees and lands on the ship and returns the bag to the lady. And the video

ends with “sting life ka switch on” a screen shot of the video is in Figure 2.

The fourth video is sting rush. 1,700 views posted 1 year ago. This is a 38 second video.

There are 14 likes and 6 dislikes and 2 comments saying no one will play this game with these

graphics. The video is animated. It start with a boys still picture jumping and says “a hero will

rise”. Then the boy is in a sprint race position and it says “with only one goal”. The camera then

zooms close to his face and says “On his mind”. Then he drinks sting and he has lightening

around him. Then he the next picture is of him running and it says “with speeds unknown to

man”. Then a cellphone appears on the right side where that character is running in a game and it

says “push your speed to the limit”. Then the cell phone goes to the left side of the video and the

right side says “unlock new levels”, it then says “make the online leaderboard rankings” and then

“Download now” and has rush written in front of the sting logo. The video ends with that game

logo. A screenshot of the video is in figure 3.

The fifth video is ‘Is the monotony of your daily routine getting to you?’. It is a 30

second video and had 1,024,510 views, 1,700 likes and 1,100 dislikes and 64 comments. The

comments mostly ask who the male model is and others mostly say positive things like “nice”.
The video starts with an actress driving a race car, there is a spark in the engine and the car stops.

Other racer are about to run in to her. A racer (that’s not a part of that race) drinks sting, and

starts throwing spare tires in front of the car and saves her from getting ran in by the others. The

and ends with all the racers are standing together and a voice says “sting life ka switch on”

The remaining videos all feature Amir Khan the boxer and are 1 year old (and the oldest I

2 years old). One of the videos is ‘#StingChallenge - Break The Code’ with 3530 views, 17 likes,

5 dislikes and no comments. It is a 15 second video. The sting challenge hash tag has 10,000

subscribers. The video starts with Amir Khan’s picture and it says watch king khan live. Then

the camera zooms in a sting bottle and there is a code game behind it and a voice says “collect

the label, logon on the stings facebook page, break the code, and get a chance to watch Amir

Khans next fight, and win exciting prices”. Figure 5 show the 7 videos featuring Amir Khan.

The next video is Challenge # 1 - Bottle Juggling. It is 1 minute 11 seconds long. It has

the hash tag #StingChallenge, and with 80,255 views, with 575 likes, 31 dislikes and 84

comments with most people insisting the video is fake and few who liked it. The video starts

with Amir juggling with a sting bottle as he boxes. Then it says “first challenge. What challenge

do you have for the King”. Then comments appear requesting for different challenges. It says

bottle challenge and Amir drinks sting and shows the bottle juggling for a fan. The video ends

with it saying Khan 1, Fans 0. And then he drinks sting in slow motion and it and it says

#stingchallenge dare to challenge Amir Khan.

The next video is Challenge # 2 – Box with the beat. It is 48 seconds long. It has the same

hash tag #StingChallenge, and with 18,953 views, with 92 likes, 32 dislikes and 6 comments

irrelevant to sting or the challenge. The video starts with Amir boxing with the beat of a dhol. it
says “second challenge. What challenge do you have for the King”. Then comments appear

requesting for different challenges. The video ends the same way as the previous; it says Khan 2,

Fans 0. And then he drinks sting in slow motion and it and it says #stingchallenge dare to

challenge Amir Khan.

The next video is Challenge # 3 – knockout the flames. It is 52 seconds long. The same

hash tag #StingChallenge, and with 1,370,470 views, with 9,200 likes, 2,300 dislikes and 860

comments with the vast majority saying it is fake. The video starts with Amir throwing one

punch at candles and it says “third challenge. What challenge do you have for the King”. Then

comments appear requesting for different challenges like in all of his videos of this challenge.

Then amir throws a punch and all the 12 candles are lit out. The video ends the same way as the

previous; it says Khan 2, Fans 1. And then he drinks sting in slow motion and it and it says

#stingchallenge dare to challenge Amir Khan.

The next video is Challenge # 4 – skip rope. It is 42 seconds long. With the hash tag

#StingChallenge, and with 50,300 views, with 163 likes, 23 dislikes and 5 comments are

sarcastic saying do different challenges trying to make fun of the boxer. The video starts with

Amir skipping a rope. It says “fourth challenge. What challenge do you have for the King”. Then

comments appear requesting for different challenges. Amir skips the rope for a few seconds and

the video ends the same way as the previous; it says Khan 3, Fans 1. And then he drinks sting in

slow motion and it and it says #stingchallenge dare to challenge Amir Khan.

The next video is Challenge # 5 – speed boxing with the hash tag #StingChallenge. It is 1

minute and 9 seconds long and with 50,759 views, with 266 likes, 42 dislikes and 11 comments

with different comments; some requesting for more challenges, some criticizing him being
slower than Muhammad Ali and others were impressed by him. The video starts with “fifth

challenge. What challenge do you have for the King”. Then comments appear requesting for

different challenges. Amir give 143 speed punches and the video ends the same way as the

previous; it says Khan 4, Fans 1. And then he drinks sting in slow motion and it and it says

#stingchallenge dare to challenge Amir Khan as all the previous 4 videos ended.

The oldest video is a 2 minute 55 second video 1,067,383 views, 1,700 likes and 726

dislikes and 157 comments. The name of the video is ‘the sting challenge featuring Amir Khan’.

The #StingChallenge hash tag is there as well. The comments are very positive regarding the

boxer, the song, number of views as well as sting the drink very few were negative comments.

Common words were “inspirational” and “nice”. The video starts with Amir wrapping has hands

with a black cloth and then he starts running. He runs into Shoaib Malik; the cricketer as well.

He does various exercises demonstrating his strength the agility. As he runs, fans chase him. At

the end he stands and looks at the Pakistani flag and a fan gives Amir a sting bottle. He drinks it

and the video ends the same way as the 5 sting challenge videos.

Figure 1
Figure 2

Figure 3
Figure 4

Figure 5
Figure 6

Amir Khan Sponsorship – Analysis

PepsiCo arranged an ad with Amir Khan is a Olympics Boxing Champion. He used the city of

Lahore for training in an advertisement mentioned above as well. Fans were requested to

participate in the video. The Sting brand is used several times in the ad as he drinks the bottle of

sting towards the end of the video as well as when a shop keeper opens a shutter with Sting’s ad

on it. Shoaib Malik had a short appearance as well. Facebook has more viewers for the video

than the youtube video. The theme was patriotic in nature. The videos on youtube that followed

this ad were the challenges that fans fared Amir Khan to do.

Sting – Pinterest Anlaysis

Figures 7-15 below show the images of pins of Sting Energy Drink. Sting is not very popular on

Pinterest, as compared to its following on youtube, facebook and instagram.

There was one pin that showed a link to buy sting online; Figure 11 from chase.pk. They had the

following hashtags: #stingenergydrink, #energydrink, #energy, #candrink, #extremeenergy,

#berryflavor, #berrydrink, #energyhealing , #energy_diet, #calories, #ordernow , #onlineorder ,

#onlineshopping, #orderonline, #grabonline, #drink, #drinks, #pakistan, #karachi, #sindh. Only one

Behance had 1.4 million followers. Qne also had 26 followers (figure 9). The rest of the pins

were not by those with any followers.

Figure 7

Figure 8
Figure 9

Figure 10

Figure 11
Figure 12
Figure 13

Figure 14

Figure 15
Analysis of Blogs of Sting
The firsst blog; ‘Pepsico features Olympic star on #StingChallenge campaign’ written by

Monisha Rao. This article again discusses what has been covered in detail about the sponsorship

of Sting, and in the youtube analysis. PepsiCo made a campaign with Amir Khan, the Olympics

boxer a Challenge which went viral on the social media. With 1 million views on youtube and 11

million on facebook the video was a success. The video shows the boxer coming back to his

heritage and marketed the brand well. However, after the recent issue with the Government this

year things have changed drastically for the brand.

In the second blog titled: ‘Punjab Food Authority just destroyed more than 5 Lakh cans

of energy drinks’ the writer; ‘Trending team’ say that PFA (Punjab Food Authority) had a major

crackdown took place on energy drinks. The term “Energy drink” is misleading on a can as the

amount of caffeine has numerous side effects namely “damage to the nervous system, blood

pressure, obesity, insomnia, hypertension, cardiac arrest”. As a result the brands; sting, Red Bull,

and Monster must have ‘Highly caffeinated drink’ rather than energy drink written on them.

This is a major challenge for these brands and will have to be tackled very carefully as their

reputation has been tarnished.

 The third blog ‘Punjab Food Authority Issues Notice To Sting Energy Drink’ written by

Sumaira FHs. On 18th December last year, Sting was issued a notice by PFA regarding not being

allowed to air their latest advertisement. They were accused of painting the incorrect picture of

what the drink actually does. It is compulsory to have the approval of PFA regarding the contents

in the drink. The only single comment on the blog implied that various companies and brands

and products are harmful namely cigarettes and so on. However, the Government has never

touched them. As true as that may be the word Energy Drink is misleading and must be changed.