Coca Cola : I know that sound

A lot of heritage brands have sonic trademarks and identities that have become invaluable brand codes (KBA’s). They can employ these audible properties in their comms and across their various touchpoints to drive brand salience and instantaneously cut through in our system one world.

When it comes to these audio signatures, Coke have so many. From their infamous jiggle “I’m loving it”, to the sound the bottle makes when you open it.

While the latter isn’t technically ownable, it is still so distinctive. The brand over the years has managed to inextricably connect these natural, category sounds to their brand, so now when you hear them there is only one curvy bottle that appears in the mind’s eye.

Not one to miss a trick when it comes to playing with their audio assets, Coke hero them in their latest campaign which plays on Synesthesia - a sensation produced in one modality when a stimulus is applied to another modality, as when the hearing of a certain sound induces the visualisation of a certain colour.

A new campaign for the European market from David Miami banks on the idea that the sight of a bubbly glass of Coke will have an synesthetic effect on consumers--so that by merely looking at the ads, they’ll be able to “hear” them.

The effort features a series of close-up shots of the soda in a glass, an opener prying the cap off a Coke bottle, a finger lifting the tab off a can. The copy then “baits” viewers: “Try not to hear this.”

The campaign is running across multiple markets in Central and Eastern Europe, on billboards, magazines and newspapers.

“With this campaign we are aiming to activate that sensorial memory from our consumers, challenging them to hear an image for the first time, finishing our ad in their heads,” says Camilla Zanaria, Coca-Cola Content Lead of Central and Eastern Europe.

Check it out here; https://adage.com/creativity/work/coca-cola-try-not-hear/2166866