Coca-Cola has cornered the market on “ahh.”
The company now owns 61 domains that are all variations on “ahh,” each one adding an h. Think ahh.com, ahhh.com, ahhhh.com, and well, you get the idea.
The domain-buying spree was in service of “The Ahh Effect,” a new campaign created by Wieden + Kennedy Portland. Seventeen of the domains are active now, but ultimately all 61 of them will host content–everything from videos to GIFs to games–designed to entertain and engage teens while subtly reinforcing the notion that Coca-Cola is “the ultimate in refreshment.”
“We’ve always talked to teens but never quite in this way and never about the product in, frankly, such a dimensionalized and fun manner,” says Pio Schunker, senior vice president, integrated marketing communications, Coca-Cola North America Group.
“The Ahh Effect” is Coca-Cola’s first digital-led effort, and, notably, the campaign doesn’t include any television commercials. “That was a very deliberate decision,” Schunker says. “We are pushing even further into digital and social more than ever before, having a lot of fun with the brand and also taking a lot more risks.”
All of the campaign’s content is optimized for mobile—“a teen’s lifeline and de facto first screen,” Schunker says. And given the target audience’s famously short attention span, the content is being delivered in what Schunker calls “snackable” pieces. Think amusing videos and GIFs that teens can choose to spend only a few seconds viewing to get the message and simple games that they can play for two or three minutes. “They can dip in, dip out, and move on,” Schunker says, adding, “and if you look at the way teens consume tweets and posts and texts, that’s pretty much their behavior.”
The content will continually be updated with fresh items throughout this year and beyond, “continuously tapping into a teen’s desire for discovery, constant stimulation, and novelty,” Schunker says. And while Wieden+Kennedy will oversee the creative process, the content will come not only from the agency but also from media partners with a teen focus like Alloy, Vevo and Break Media; from teens themselves, who will be invited to submit ideas; and from submissions by creative influencer communities like Art Center College of Design in Pasadena and Savannah College of Art and Design.
Every two weeks, Coca-Cola will determine how each piece of content is performing, and items that aren’t getting a lot of traffic or being shared via social media will be replaced. “This campaign is going to be a living experiment and true trial and error,” Schunker says, noting, “I fully expect it to evolve based on the learnings we get from teens.”