Heineken and their progress to the "icon brand" status

From original street marketing events…

…to off-the-wall interviews,

Heineken has been building a global communication strategy for the past recent years.  The brand no longer relies on product advertising only but it has diversified its communication tools, and particularly its digital marketing tools, to build its identity, give the brand a unique voice and try to reach the status of icon brand.

In order to do so, Heineken has been designing new consistent video contents around creative and even fun subjects, addressing its special target. This target is mostly composed of young men from 20 to 35 years who have the characteristics of a generation Y that is more and more connected, active on social networks, and critics about his world and environment.

Heineken now develops content to enhance recognition and feeling of belonging to its identity, content mainly revolving around its recent (2013) slogan “open your world”. For instance, the brand developed webseries such as “Dropped” illustrating values such as courage, adventure spirit, surpassing oneself which are also values that young people share today whether it be about their travels or their need for fulfilment in their job and personal life. Often distrustful about advertising and suspicious about what brands can tell them, Heineken target’s generation is even more difficult to reach. The brand’s presence on special events that this target assists – which are mainly sports and technology events- also seems to be a good strategy. Heineken has been sponsoring until 2014 the European rugby cup which name was the H Cup (Heineken Cup). 

Heineken, as its competitors, also challenges its imagination creating humoristic content, aimed at creating buzz among its target customers so they can spread the brand’s speech and raise durable awareness around the brand’s name. This is the case for its webserie “The Candidate” presented above.

In terms of product communication, we could reproach the brand not to orient their communication strategy more on their products so they could have a call-to-action that would be more important but we can find this initiative on their product packs, that is to say, directly in store. Whether it be their basic permanent product range or their products for more segmented markets, the brand keeps up with its positioning which is offering a premium beer for premium customers. In order to always offer its customer a variety a product but with the same quality of beer, the brand plays on the bottle design, collaborating with talented artists and graphic designers. Some examples are below.

The 360° communication strategy of Heineken seems to pay dividends. Selected as Brand of the Year by the MIPTV in 2012, the brand’s leadership & commitment to creating content to develop a strong unique voice and to build a recognisable identity are now well known.