Beyond The Megaphone

Speaker 1: So welcome to the Business of Marketing. I'm Justin Cooke, and I'm, uh, really excited to talk about a, a brand called Fanta, which, uh, most of us have known since childhood. Uh, that's a... Recognition is a huge advantage, but it also presents a challenge. How do you keep giving people a reason to choose a brand they already know so well? Well, today I'm joined by Ibrahim Khan from Fanta at The Coca-Cola Company. Uh, and we're gonna talk about building a global brand, decisions behind Fanta's Halloween work, and, and how you judge whether a creative idea is actually making a difference to the business. Ibrahim, welcome.

Speaker 2: Thank you so much, Justin. Happy to be here.

Speaker 1: So before we get into Fanta, I'd like to start with you. Why don't you take us a little bit back to the beginning. What first drew you to marketing?

Speaker 2: Yeah. Um, I'll, I'll just talk about it very quickly, Justin. Um, I started my career out in sales, um, not in marketing, and then I spent a little bit of time in knowledge and insights as well, which is a function around research and consumer insights. Um, and then I moved to marketing, and I think what drew me here was, um, you know, it's a really good balance between the commercial side of the business, the consumer side of the business, the strategic, uh, imperatives of the business, and that's something that really appealed. It's a lot of fun. Um, you get to do some very big things. You know, you get to do them with some very cool people. And when the work that you do has an impact, it's really re- very fulfilling. And, you know, at a company like Coke, you just get so much opportunity in the marketing function. You know, we've got giant brands, heritage brands, big brands all over the world. Um, and yeah, it just pulls you in, and before you know it, 15 years have gone by and you're- you become a marketeer.

Speaker 1: And as you've taken on bigger brands and bigger responsibilities, how has your approach to marketing changed?

Speaker 2: Um, you know, you, you live, you learn, Justin. Um, you know, when you start, you tend to be more focused on operational and executional, um, aspects of marketing, and I think when you get the experience of working on bigger scale, on bigger brands, in bigger markets, or even multiple markets, or even at a global scale like I am right now, um, you tend to develop a deep respect for what we call the fundamentals of marketing. You know, the, uh, what a product is about, what the brand is about, the, the, the four Ps of, you know, the holy grail of marketing. Um, and, and, and then, yes, also you develop a deep appreciation for how, um, one brand can express itself in so many different ways around the world in different cultures for different consumers. Um, you know, you... If you're a curious person, it really feeds that curiosity, and I think in general, there's a big lesson in humility, you know, around maybe I don't have all the answers all the time, and maybe there's never just one right answer. So those are just things that you learn along the way, um, and still so much more to go.

Speaker 1: I love that. I, I, I think that whole concept of kind of curiosity and discovery, you know, it's, it's, it, it's so, uh, in- inspiring and, and, you know, sourcing, uh, such a great source of, of inspiration, right?

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: When you've, when you've worked with some of the, the world's most recognizable brands, and effectively everyone sort of knows your name, how do you then tell whether they actually care about you?

Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, you know, m- there's a handful of brands like the one that I work on, you know, Fanta or at our company, Coke and Sprite, and so many other. We have $32 billion brands, and these brands have deep heritage. You know, they weren't born yesterday. People, generations have grown up with these brands, and not only do they know what they are, so there's a lot of s- you know, salience is high, but they also mean a lot to consumers in terms of how they've been experienced over the course of their lifetimes, uh, Justin. And that doesn't just disappear because I'm the next new brand manager on the block, you know? And so, um, you know, you really have to go deep in understanding the brand you're working on, where it began, the heritage, the history, how people experienced it over many, many decades and generations. I deeply believe our ancestors in marketing were much smarter than we are, which is why we're working on these big multi-billion dollar global brands. Um-

Speaker 1: Sure

Speaker 2: ... and the way that you measure, of course, there's formal ways of measuring whether a brand means something to consumers and what it means. You have trackers and surveys and these days, much more sophisticated tools for that. But there's also an appreciation that you develop when you put some initiative out in the world, and you see people in the millions resonating with that initiative. I mean, that then really tells you... Like you get a really, um, instinctive feel for, hey, this thing means something to a lot of people. It's a soft drink, you know, and in the bigger scheme of things, it's not the most critical thing in a person's life. But when we put out a program like Halloween, and we see millions around the world responding and resonating and having a little moment of fun around it, that tells you that your brand is not just something people know, but it's something that means, um, a lot to them, and we can, we can have an impact with that.

Speaker 1: I love the fact that you've, you've brought in that word mean because, you know, we could, we could probably spend the rest of this conversation kind of just, just kind of really just, you know, trying to discuss what does that, what does, what does mean mean? But, you know, in the context of standing on the shoulders of marketing giants, I suppose in a sense-

Speaker 2: Yeah

Speaker 1: ... what do you want Fanta to mean to people today, and how much of that has changed?

Speaker 2: It's... I, I love the question because my answer to that is I want it to mean, well, we want it to mean what it has always meant to consumers for the last 70 years. This is a 70-year-old brand.

Speaker 2: And it was created as a soft drink that's a little bit more delicious than other soft drink alternatives, and that you have when you're having fun, and that's what it has always meant. And I think at times we lose sight of what becomes the, what is the core DNA of a brand. You know, when, when you, when you're operating in 185 countries and there's thousands of people touching a brand, and there's many who have come before me and many will come after me, for any of us, sometimes you lose sight of that very core institutional knowledge of a brand, and I don't think you can change what a brand fundamentally means, um, to... It's, it's very rare that a brand at its core means different things in different parts of the world unless it had a very distinct history in that part of the world.

Speaker 1: Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: So I wa- that's what we want it to mean. And in the case of Fanta, Justin, that's, it's, it's delicious and it's fun. It's not more complicated than that. It's the drink you have when you're having fun with your friends. And now how does that execute in different times-

Speaker 1: Mm

Speaker 2: ... in different media realities for different cultures and consumers? This can change, um, and it should change. I mean, you want to be relevant and you want to be meaningful to people where they are. There is no global consumer. Like there is there-

Speaker 1: Mm-hmm

Speaker 2: ... it, it's a hypothetical, right?

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 2: Um, but the core of the brand, um, is what it should mean to everyone around the world at its very simplest, and that shouldn't change over, you know, the heritage, from, from what the heritage of the brand is.

Speaker 1: That's brilliant. And when you're working across so many markets, you know, I, I really love the kinda consistency piece there. You know, you've, you've obviously gotta sort of, you know, gotta lock in what has to remain consistent, but also you, as you said, you've got to kind of inject, um, you know, a kind of a local kind of flavor, I suppose.

Speaker 2: Right.

Speaker 1: How do you, how do you kind of, uh, give, uh, the teams, you know, around the world enough room to do things their own way but still stay on brand and consistent?

Speaker 2: Yeah. Um, look, at le- it, it's a, it's something that at least I'm still learning, Justin.

Speaker 1: Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: I won't pretend like I have the final answer to that. Um, but what I have seen is, A, having very clear knowledge on what the core of the brand is and what it isn't, and how at a strategic level we want it to execute, um, for this time, day, and consumer, right? So in the case of Fanta, for example, it's always been about delicious and fun, and it's always been b- anchored on our core flavor, which is orange. Now, delicious and fun today looks a little bit different to what delicious and fun looked like 20 years ago, especially the fun aspect of it, which is now taking the shape of entertainment, whereas in the past maybe it was something else. And so for example, I like to think about Fanta as an entertainment brand, um, and, and that's our gateway to connecting with younger consumers, and that's what we found very effective. Now, those are the pillars of the brand. Now, what entertainment means in the Philippines may be different to what entertainment means in the UAE where you're at, or what it means here in the USA where I'm at. Um, and that's where I think you have to give some freedom, um, to make sure that, uh, that it's culturally relevant, um, that it's actually meaningful, that it can actually connect and break through the clutter, um, of a lot of, a lot of other brands and marketing.

Speaker 1: I love it. Back to your point around sort of curiosity, uh, k- and, and then sort of just, you know, citing those kind of markets, just as you did. Can you think of a, an example of a, a local idea that sort of has, you know, kind of perhaps changed how you thought about the brand globally?

Speaker 2: Um, I mean, yes, absolutely. Look, w- one thing is that we tend to think about these global brands as monoliths and just instinctively associate them with either the US or the West or where they originated from, and I don't think that's really true. So for example, Fanta's always been activating Halloween here in the US and in Latin America and in Europe for the last 10 years or so. Um, and it's only been the last three years that we've really scaled this into a big global program. But if you think about that, um, it's a local insight from the US based on which we're activated. Fanta didn't start in the US, by the way. It started in Europe. So you're talking about a, a, a brand that did not originate in the US that built a very big equity and heritage around an American festivity, um, and then that, that we scaled out to other markets, okay? So that's very much a local insight. Now, the question was, well, why does it work so well with Halloween? Why is it that when I close my eyes and I think about Fanta and Halloween, it makes sense, but if I close my eyes and I think about Fanta and Christmas, it doesn't make so much sense? And that's where you start to understand, um, well, that's because it's delicious and it's fun, and this festive is about- Having delicious things and having a bit of fun. And that's the thought that then we've taken and we've scaled into other markets as well. So for example, in Indonesia and in Philippines, there is a giant culture around horror. You would be amazed. If you've been to that part of the world, it's literally weekend activity. Okay? Um, there's a huge industry behind it, and so we took the, um, con- And, and the reasons why people enjoy it there is the same reason why people enjoy Halloween and horror within the Halloween context here. And so that's how we scaled it over there. Or if you think about other festivities, like in India, um, we activate Fanta around Holi or, you know, and so on and so forth. You know? And so sometimes if you understand the essence of an insight, in this case it was, you know, when you want something delicious and fun, there's very few brands and products out there like that satisfy that job as well as Fanta does, then you know what you're looking for around different parts of the world, and it becomes a part of the essence of the brand.

Speaker 1: That's fascinating. We're, we're moving, uh, in a very f- fast-moving world. You, you've got scale, you know, with Coke, you've got appr- uh, processes, you've got a brand to protect, you've got approvals, a lot of people involved. How do you like to move quickly enough to kind of make an idea happen while it still matters?

Speaker 2: Um, I mean, that's, that's the question we're always thinking about. You know-

Speaker 1: Yeah

Speaker 2: ... how do we set up and organize to make sure that we are consistent and scaled, but also fresh and locally relevant. And, um, I think, I, I thi- I think fundamentally just because we can do something doesn't mean we should do it. So that, that's the starting point. Okay? And so especially today when you look out there, there's 100 different fads and 100 different cultural shifts and 100 different things that are happening out there, and the competitive activity is intense, and if we start reacting to everything, Justin, we'll end up doing nothing. And especially at the scale at which we operate, it'll be impossible. So we can't compete with much smaller, nimbler local competitors at their level. So it's knowing what our competitive advantages are, and our competitive advantages are we have this huge heritage, we have a lot of salience, um, we need to be clear on what this brand stands for and what we can do. Okay? So that's one part of it. The other part of... And that's what allows us to compete with our competitive advantage, which is scale, which is heritage, and which is salience, and which is... Now, if we're clear on what this brand stands for, we'll catch the right shifts and trends when it matters most. At the same time, you do want to leave room and, uh, openness for people to try stuff. I mean, I don't think we would have had a globally scaled Halloween program if certain markets had not been activating that for the last 10 years. I don't think we would have had the global scaled gaming program that we started launching as of this year if certain markets had not tried their hand at that before, right? And so you have to leave openness to people trying stuff and make sure that you have a systematic way of surfacing what works, and then being able to scale that.

Speaker 1: You've, you've set us up really well to kind of start to now zero in a little bit. It's October 26 as we're talking.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: Um, I wanna kind of now get a bit deeper into Halloween and Haunted Universe because it gives us something really concrete, relevant, current to explore.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: Um, tell me, you've, you've sort of, you've given me a kinda sense of kind of what makes Halloween such a good fit for Fanta.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: But, but sort of take us back to the first conversations about Haunted Universe. You know, what were you trying to achieve? How did the idea develop?

Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. Um, so we, as I say, for the last 10 years we've been doing it, but at a market level, and for the last three-

Speaker 1: Yeah

Speaker 2: ... we've started scaling it into a repeatable global platform for the brand. We started initially with, um, third-party collaborations, popular IP with existing fandoms that overlap nicely with fans of our brand and created some real nice value and exciting experiences for consumers. And what we started noticing last year, Justin, um, you know, with the brand doing very well and the business doing very well and really becoming a part of the Halloween tradition, um, is people started asking us not whether Fanta will do Halloween next year-

Speaker 1: Hmm

Speaker 2: ... but what will Fanta do in Halloween next year? And that's when we got to thinking around, well, look, this needs to be something that we are able to build, invest, and sustain, and a platform that should compound for us over many, many years and decades to come. And that's where the thought of, um, building our own universe, uh, originated. Okay? Now we have, of course, the inspiration of, um, brand Coke, which did the exact same thing all that time ago with Christmas, and really our vision is for f- for Halloween to become for Fanta what Christmas is to Coke. And we took a few leaves out of the Coke playbook, you know, Santa and the world that they had built around Santa, and so we started doing our homework and our research around, well, what is Halloween? What does it mean in different parts of the world? Clearly horror and, and, and thrillers play a big role. Culture around that plays a big role. Um, what are the semiotics of the festivity? What are the archetypes of the festivity? What do people expect? And we, we believe, like You know, it made sense to, um, start shaping our own universe, Fanta's haunted universe. And we spent the better part of the last 18 months, um, designing, developing, testing, refining, um, until, you know, you see the first iteration of what, what we- we've done, um, this year. And so far it's done very well. Um, it's not everything that we've developed. We have a whole pipeline of things, um, i- in, in the backend that's going to come. Um, but that was really the idea. The idea is for 20 years from now, the brand manager on Fanta should look at Halloween and say, "Hey, um, who made this decision? It was a really good decision-

Speaker 2: ... and let's build on that." Much as this, now we sit and we talk about Coke and Christmas.

Speaker 1: I love that. And to your point earlier about sort of the legends that have preceded you and you effectively standing on their shoulders, maybe there'll be a podcast, uh, h- having a conversation about, about this in 20 years' time. Um-

Speaker 2: Yeah. I think, I think, like, our job is really to leave these brands in a slightly better place than-

Speaker 1: Yeah

Speaker 2: ... when we got here.

Speaker 1: I love that.

Speaker 2: Like, that's the job.

Speaker 1: I love that philosophy. Um, so you talked about fandom then. So, you know, when you're working with kind of en- entertainment properties and characters that people already love, there's always a chance they sort of remember the character, forget the brand. How do you make Fanta an essential part of the idea?

Speaker 2: Uh, it comes to the idea itself, Justin, and the clarity that you have on the brand. Our idea for Halloween is deceptively simple. It's so delicious, even the dead crave it.

Speaker 2: Now, if that's your idea... Um, because Halloween is the festivity when your deepest cravings come back to life, right? That's the whole essence of that festivity. And so if you have a... If you can explain that, you're always gonna have Fanta, its deliciousness, and its fun at the heart of every experience that we create. Then it's the universe and the IP and the collaborations and the activations all in the service of the business and the brand and what it stands for. And that's why if you look at the way we've designed the program, really the heart of the experience lies in the product, in the pack, and in that collection. So we're always doing this limited time flavor with some popular IP that fans love. We're always doing a limited time takeover and collectible series of packaging. Then we build a retail theater around that. There's a connected pack experience, we call it our digital trick-or-treat bag. So you scan the pack, and you can get access to a lot of nice stuff, um, that we provide uniquely as a brand. Um, and so that's really how, how, how we think about it.

Speaker 1: Love it. What, what have you learnt about how people respond when Fanta is entering that sort of entertainment space?

Speaker 2: I find, you know, it's interesting because w- in the last three years we've sort of been on this journey of rediscovering this brand. Um, and in that process, sometimes we would get this question around, "Well, um, is Fan- what kind of brand is Fanta?" You know? And, and people would pitch to us s- at times lifestyle photography around Fanta, and we would look at this lifestyle photography, and we would be like, "Does that really make sense for this brand?" Like, do I really imagine people walking around a high street holding a can of Fanta in their hand? I really doubt it. But it did beg the question then, well, what kind of brand is Fanta? And that's when we realized, well, if you're delicious and fun, you're really in the business of entertainment as things stand today, whether it's directly or whether it's through association or through collaboration. And what we found is that there is a big overlap between fans of entertainment IP and fans of this brand. That's why when we do what we do, which by the way, we uniquely have the skill to do it, um, we see such huge resonance amongst fans, and that's why the partners are also happy to work with us 'cause we create value for them, they create value for us. And so far we've just seen that, that we've sort of found the sweet spot for the brand in how people respond.

Speaker 1: Let's talk a little bit about creativity and results and taking risks. I want to get into the sort of the decisions behind, you know, the work, work like this. When a, when a big creative idea lands on your desk, what makes you think, "Yes, this is worth backing"?

Speaker 2: I think the first question to ask is always does it solve a real business opportunity or challenge on the brand? Um, and if you're not clear on what the brief on the brand is, it's impossible to tell whether a idea is good or bad. It may be good in a different context, but it may not be good in the context of your brand. So that's step number one. I think step number two is will it get noticed? I mean, it's so... You know, we're always fighting irrelevance. It's like if you're standing still, you're not really standing still, you're moving back because the world is moving forward so fast, right? So, um, and so you really do need to do things that people will notice and care about. And then three, our, our ability to execute it. I mean, an idea is only as good as its execution, otherwise it's just a PowerPoint slide or it's a thought. And so if, if you have an idea that is solving a real business challenge and issue, um, or an opportunity, um, if it, if it feels audacious and creative enough that people will notice, um, and care about, um, and if we have the ability to execute it, um, then I think that's, those are ideas that we back. Now, it's important to say that the ability to execute We're always pushing ourselves very hard. Some of the stuff that we've done on Fanta not only has never been done on Fanta before, but it's not been done by any brand before. Like, if you look at some of the things that we're doing, launching our own entertainment universe is not a small thing to do.

Speaker 2: W- whether it's successful or not is a different topic. It's just not a small thing to do. Like, we know how much blood, sweat, and tear, and how many people worked how hard. I mean, W- Grail, um, Grail is our entertainment studio partner on the Haunted Universe piece. They come from a background of, um, Hollywood entertainment and production, um, expertise and technology, and they just came in with a lot of passion. And imagine, like, if I said to you, Justin, um, "Vampires, Frankensteins, werewolves, and witches," you'd be like, "Meh, been done. Everyone has done it." They came to us with this insane proof of concept where it wasn't just v- vampires, Draculas, Frankensteins, and witches. It was just this universe that blew us away. Um, and we were like, "Wow, this is insane," right? Um-

Speaker 2: ... but what blew us away was that we could execute something like that in this day and age, and that's why you see what you're seeing, um, in the world right now. Doesn't mean we got everything perfect. It just means that it was worth, um, starting this journey.

Speaker 1: Let's zero in a bit more about sort of how today we, we measure success. You know, uh, you know, 20, 30 years ago, maybe the, the measures and the metrics were different. Maybe they're the same. How do you, how do you think about sort of, you know, um, you know, knowing what's made a, a meaningful difference to Fanta?

Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. Um, look, I, I have one, and our team has one KPI above all else, and that's business. And that's really why, that's really why marketing exists, man. I think-

Speaker 1: Yep

Speaker 2: ... I think at some point in the last couple of decades, there is a, a, a sense that marketing is a communications function. Marketing is not a communications function. Communication became our main tool in the TV era because through sim- the simple act of a 30-second TVC, we were able to drive the brand, the business, and the perception of that brand. But that was a blip in the history of marketing, right? And I think it's come f- back full circle, um, to marketing is about the product, um, it's about the pricing, it's about the advertising, it's about the brand, it's about the distribution, that it's about the business. We drive growth through the business of creativity. That's what we do. Now, to answer your question, growth is the main KPI. Yes, there are many other metrics that we measure on brand equity, on penetration, on incidents, on perceptions, on relevance that drive that growth, but ultimately, we're here to drive that growth. And our CMO just I think yesterday or day before, Manolo was in a, in, in a conference here in the US where he rightly said, he said, "For the longest of times, we've been measuring a metric called love," which is great because it measures how people feel about your brand. It measures the relationship people have with the brand. But what we saw is that it does not always translate into business, and that there is a job that we need to do in taking that brand love and translating it into repeatable business growth, into a sustainable growth model. And so that's really, Justin, how I and the team here, and really as a marketing function in general, we think about our KPIs, is we make a difference if we can drive growth on the business. Now, we drive that growth on the business through creativity, but that, you know, that, that's a different, um, topic.

Speaker 1: It is, and it's a great segue into my next question, because how do you, how do you foster that culture of, of creativity where people like Grail are coming in, and they're perhaps presenting stuff that is, you know, basically challenging you or blowing your mind? How do you, how do you kinda get the best out of your teams and your agencies to, to achieve those sorts of outcomes?

Speaker 2: Yeah. I... Look, I, again, I won't pretend like I have all the answers to this-

Speaker 1: Mm-hmm

Speaker 2: ... because I think there's people who do that very, very well, and, and, and I look to them also to learn. Um, but there's a few general ingredients. I mean, you want... The more people who understand the brand at its very core, the higher the chance you have of people coming up with ideas that will help that brand deliver. So that's number one. And so that requires you to have deep knowledge and to be able to distribute that knowledge across your system, but your partners and the outside world as well. Okay? So that's one. The clearer your brand, the higher the chance of getting good creativity is there. The second piece is trust and transparency, right? You have to have an openness to listen to ideas. Doesn't mean you w- you will agree with all ideas, but there must be an openness. And the third piece is what I found, especially amongst highly creative people, what they value more than anything else is when their work actually sees the light of day, when it, when it hits the real world, you know? I think there's very few things that are more frustrating for a creative person, and all of us are creative, I mean, for creative ideas that never see the, uh, see the real world. And so if you're able to establish as a brand and as a team, um, credibility in if I take a good idea to this team and it's, and they like it, there's a high chance that we will see it impacting the world. So think about, if you think about Grail, they brought us a two-minute video telling us what this universe could look like, which today is a campaign in 40 markets where we've sold more than a billion packs, and we're in, in, in hundreds and thousands of stores, and that is, that is growing the business, uh, like crazy. We're sold out in the US. It's on many SKUs, and it's two weeks before Halloween, right?

Speaker 1: Wow.

Speaker 2: And so that creates credibility for, um, other people to come and then offer us their, um, ideas and their solutions, both from within the company and from outside the company, okay? Um, and so really the... I mean, for me, it's those things that then... A- and, and, you know, it's a virtuous cycle, if I may, because now we do this year, next year we're gonna get more ideas, then we're gonna get more ideas, and as long as we sustain that, um, it just keeps building.

Speaker 1: That's a great way of phrasing it. Um, when people are discovering brands through creators and entertainment, which we've already talked about, and even their own communities, tell me about sort of wh- how you see traditional advertising fitting into that.

Speaker 2: I think it has a role to play.

Speaker 1: Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: I mean, I don't, I, I don't think we should vilify traditional advertising or the TVC or the TV media channel or... No, I think it has a role to play. I just think that role has changed, and I think it has changed versus what it was for, like, 10 or 20 years, not before that and not after that. Uh, think about it like this. When I was growing up, TV played... It, it was my source of news, information, entertainment. It's where I sat down with my friends, with my family. Our lives revolved around this object called the TV. And so as a marketeer, we had this giant megaphone where we could actually influence the opinion of a brand and in its entirety, and therefore the business that we were able to drive through one act and one act alone, it was a 30-second TVC, okay? And I think to some degrees it's made us a bit lazy as a function because now that's the muscle that we have, and it's kinda hard to stretch ourselves, you know, in any other way. And I think the brands and the marketeers that are being successful today have found their ability to move on from that. Now, does that mean that TV doesn't play a role? No, it does. Does, uh, does out-of-home media not play a role? Yes, it does. Does retail activ- No, of course it does. It just means that some of those things have been replaced with new channels and technologies. For example, the TV role that TV plays has frankly been replaced by platforms like TikTok and Instagram Reels 'cause that's where people go for their news and their entertainment and their discovery and their socializing. And guess what? On those platforms, we don't hold the mic, audiences hold the mic. And so the best chance that you have of actually getting anyone to take notice is if you get them to talk about your brand. And the way to get t- them to talk about your brand is if you can do something meaningful with your product first. And so the starting point goes back to your product, not to your ad.

Speaker 1: You've obviously been, you know, investing in all sorts of different innovation, and it would be remiss of me not to sort of ask you about sort of your own kind of philosophy when it comes to AI in terms of, you know, your relationship with that and, and how and what you're doing with it to kind of build the brand, execute campaigns.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: Where do... W- give me, give me a kind of perspective on that.

Speaker 2: Look, I think we're very lucky, um, to work in a, a, a marketing organization like Coca-Cola where we are encouraged to try and experiment and, you know, see how new technologies and new eras come into play in our work. So that's one. And so in that sense, we get opportunity. And AI is one of those topics which I think is bringing such significant change that there's important conversations to have about it in terms of what role it plays and what it doesn't. But I think within our field, really, Justin, it's a tool, um, like any other tool. Um, and if we use it well, it will help us do our work and, and achieve our objectives better and faster, uh, more effectively, and if we don't, we'll probably get left behind. And so, for example, Halloween, if you think about Halloween, the only reason we were able to do what we did, um, and it took no less effort than any other Halloween has from a perspective of people and resources, is because we used AI in some of the, um, production processes to create this world. And look, think about it like this. Before the '80s, all entertainment was hand-drawn, okay? Can you imagine all these amazing worlds and IPs that we've all grown up with and now our kids are watching and enjoying if people were still hand-drawing everything? No. What enabled that was the technological evolution of computer graphics and people who were able to do that. And so we're just at that next evolution in terms of technology that is gonna allow us to create even bigger, more expansive, more interesting experiences for people to enjoy. And to that degree, it's a tool. And human creativity, human judgment, taste, um, and decision-making has not gone away anywhere, in my opinion, and will not go away anywhere in how we do our work or how we did the work on this particular program. Um, Grail brought to us writers from Hollywood, um, very popular illustrators. Um, we're just releasing a comic book, our very first comic book for Fanta's Haunted Universe that was done by a very well-known illustrator and comic book writer. Um, the c- the art on the, on the, on the packs that we've put in the market is done by some really good artists. And so it's a whole host... The characters that we've built, the lore, the history was researched by PhDs in, in, in lore and culture. And so, and so there's a lot of people that have worked on this, and AI was an enabler and a tool that allowed us to do something that perhaps, uh, we couldn't have done in its entirety before. That, that's really the difference. And there are some misperceptions where, you know, there's this notion where it's someone sitting pressing a few buttons and the Fanta's Haunted Universe pops out the other end. It's, it's just not quite like that.

Speaker 1: I, I'd love to keep this conversation going, but you're a busy man. You've got a campaign to execute. Um, final question. Um, five years from now, what's gonna separate the brands that people still care about from those that they simply recognize?

Speaker 2: Um, I wish I knew, Justin.

Speaker 2: And if you, if you find the answer, please let me know as well, um, because my- at least my headlines don't work that far into the future.

Speaker 2: But, uh, but look, I think, I think, as I say, at least for brands like us in our industry, we're, we're just constantly fighting irrelevance, and we're not just competing with our, our own categories and our own things. We're fighting for relevance in what is becoming an increasingly overstimulated, um, landscape. And so the brands that will still mean and stand out will be the ones that find ways of cutting through that and staying relevant. Um, and that's where we're constantly just going to have to find ways, um, of getting noticed, but in, in, in strategically correct ways. Getting noticed for the sake of getting noticed is not an objective either.

Speaker 1: I love it. Ibrahim, thank you so much for joining me, and thank you for listening to Business of Marketing. If you enjoyed the conversation, follow the show, share it with someone you think would enjoy it. I'm Justin Cook. See you next time.

Speaker 2: Thank you, Justin. Appreciate it.