Coca-Cola drew a lot of interesting controversy during the Super Bowl with its anti-cyberbullying ad. While the #makeithappy ad campaign was well-intentioned, it left a weird taste in consumers' mouths.
Despite the weird reception, it appears that Coca-Cola is taking a new approach to the #makeithappy campaign with its latest endeavor. Coca-Cola Puerto Rico recently started the first emoji-based URL campaign. Users will be able to input various URLs with either emoticons or emojis into their browser that will send them to emoticoke.com.
However, emojis aren't compatible with the standard URL, such as .com, .net or .org. So Coca-Cola's advertising agency chose an unorthodox domain; .WS. According to the agency, "we opted to go with the .ws because the letters could stand for 'We smile' and hence seemed most relevant to the brand."
But why consider using emojis on a URL at all?
"The vast majority of our audience now visits our site via a mobile device. And since emojis have become a kind of second language for Coke's younger consumers, we felt this was a great opportunity to connect on a deeper level with our most important demographic," Coca-Cola Puerto Rico President Alejandro Gomez told AdWeek.
