Dr Pepper, the oldest major soft drink in America, has been a one-of-a-kind brand since its inception in 1885. We’re still one-of-a-kind on all accounts: flavor profiles, brand values, and most importantly, fandom.
In a world where both average consumers and die-hard fans are inundated with content on a deluge of social channels, we need to make sure our one-of-a-kind nature comes through in our content to both match that fandom and stoke it in a way that feels native to the social platform it lives on.
To make the most of each social channel, we cater the fandom content we create to feel native to that specific platform and play to their strengths instead of repurposing the same content on every platform.
For Instagram, we run our page primarily like a meme-page that is run by a Dr Pepper fan. The ability to lean into memes allows us to play with different meme formats, whether those are traditional memes with text on the top and bottom of an image or memes that we create on our own that take into account the humor of what we see on the internet.
On X, we lean into what makes that platform unique: real-time conversations/topics and copy-first content that is short, sweet, and pithy. The real-time conversations/topics allow us to take advantage of popular text-based “meme” formats that go viral on the platform and reap the benefits of being reactive in a way that is unique and true to Dr Pepper and its fandom. For short, sweet, and pithy content, we do exactly that: infuse Dr Pepper fandom and brand love into copy that is easy to digest while playing into the inherent wit that runs on the platform.
On TikTok, we have carved a place for the brand in a similar way to how we approach X. Our typical content leverages what makes TikTok, well, TikTok…a little more lo-fi, utilizing music/audio, storytelling, and humor that can be absurd at times. But, we also create reactive content based on popular TikTok trends we see in our feeds and put that Dr Pepper spin on it. Due to the lo-fi nature of TikTok, this allows us to be nimble and quick to shoot content, get approvals, and post it while the trend is still going around the FYP.
We’re also active on other platforms, such as Facebook and Threads, where we tailor what content we share based on the audiences on each channel.
We continue to see that despite the ever-changing algorithm and shrinking organic reach, our content breaks through to our fans (and beyond at times). We consistently see our fans showing up and engaging with our content due to the desire of our fans to be just that—fans that want to share their love with their own audiences.
And our social performance for 2023 tells that story. We saw multiple new additions to all-time best performers for our social content on Instagram, TikTok, and X in terms of the brand’s historical engagement rate benchmarks. We consistently see a majority of our social channels perform above our 2022 benchmarks, fueled by fans sharing, commenting, or liking our posts.
In the comments, we often see fans commenting things like, “Your caption is so me,” “I feel seen,” and, “Dr Pepper, you’re so real for this” due to the relatability that fuels our content.
Highlights for this year include:
● Total of 2.4MM organic engagements & 68.4MM impressions across all channels
● Dr Pepper is the #2 most followed CSD and #1 most engaged with CSD on TikTok
● Gained 200K TikTok followers in 2023, now at 760K followers
● We saw 11.7% increase in new followers on Instagram, now at 688K followers
● We saw +54% impressions and +71% engagement on the average Instagram post in 2023 vs. 2022.
● The top Facebook post in 2023 saw 6.8MM organic impressions and 1.9MM engagements
● 100% of reactive content on TikTok performed above the benchmark
● Evergreen and timely meme content performs on par with or above flavor drops and new product announcements , which historically have been top engagement drivers for the brand
