Communication Strategies at Red Bull: SWOT Analysis and Comparison with Competitors

This report analyses the communication mechanism at the Red Bull. It provides strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of the communication strategy that is used within Red Bull. Communicational practice of Coca-cola and Pepsico has been illustrated in the report along with recommendations for communicational strategies that can be used by Red bull.

MANAGEMENT

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Communication is the most essential aspect of the modern day business. It is essential for the
organisations to understand the challenges they are facing in their communicational
mechanism. This report analyses the communication mechanism at the Red Bull. It is seen
that company is using verbal communication as their major form of non-electronic
communication strategy. In terms of electronic communication methods they are using
mobile technologies, social media sites, blogs and E-mails so as to improve their performance
related to communication. These communicational channels have enabled them in bringing
the effectiveness in the flow of ideas. This report provides the strengths, weaknesses,
opportunities and threats of the communication strategy that is used within Red Bull.
Communicational practice of Coca-cola and Pepsico has been illustrated in the report along
with recommendations for communicational strategies that can be used by Red bull.

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Contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY...................................................................................................................1
INTRODUCTION.................................................................................................................................2
Key non-electronic communication methods used by Red Bull............................................................2
Electronic media and communication strategies....................................................................................3
SWOT analysis of Red Bull’s communication strategies......................................................................5
Comparison of the communicational practice of the 2 competitors.......................................................6
Recommendation for improving communication at Red Bull................................................................8
CONCLUSION.....................................................................................................................................9
REFERENCES......................................................................................................................................9
INTRODUCTION
Communication has become one of the most essential aspects in the modern day business.
Companies are using different types of strategies so as strengthen their communication

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strategies. Since internet has become a common medium for communication hence the
companies have also started taking use of it for improving their communication
( Waterhouse, et al. 2010). Electronic media and communication strategy has become
essential for customers especially when it comes to use of social media and other websites. E-
communication has boosted both internal and external communication. Red Bull is an energy
drink that is sold by Red Bull GmbH. Company was found in 1987 and current has the
highest market share among all the energy drinks in the world. Company is selling approx.
6.302 billion cans in a year. This report analyses the key non-communication practices and
methods that a firm is using so as to engage with their suppliers, publics, and the staff
members. It also provides the overview of the electronic media and communication strategies
used by the firm that includes different electronic platforms. Strength and weakness of the
company’s communication strategy along with comparison of the communication practices of
their competitors has been done. In the last part suggestions and recommendations about the
ways to improve communication within the organisation has been illustrated.
Key non-electronic communication methods used by Red Bull
Non-electronic communication methods were widely used in the organisation for their
internal communication in the previous times but it is neither fast not effective in the modern
times (E. Kunz, Elsässer and Santomier, 2016). Red Bull uses this communicational medium
for distributing messages along their internal stakeholders. Primary non-electronic
communication method includes:
 Invoices: This is used by the management to convey any particular kind of messages
to its employees. This is one of the most traditional methods of communication that
was and is used within the firm.
 Flowcharts: This is used by the managers in the Red Bull so as to explain any
procedures within the firm to their employees. This is generally used in the meetings
so as to explain the process or any other structural things (Daly, Liou and Brown,
2016).
 Verbal communication: This is the highly used non-electronic communication
methods used in the organisation. Employees interact with each other through verbal
communication so as to increase the co-ordination among them and to improve the
strategies related to teamwork. There is a particular standard that has set within the
firm and the employees have to confer with each other in that manner only.

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For interacting with customers company takes the use of direct verbal communication. For
this they have sales team. It helps them in understanding the demands of the people and take
feedback from them about their existing products. Apart from this they have customer
relationship team that helps them in solving the queries of the customers which helps them in
converting from potential to actual buyers (Bughin, Doogan and Vetvik, 2010). Verbal
communication is also used by the managers and leaders for communicating vision, mission
and plans of the organisation along with the strategies so that no confusions remains in the
minds of the people. This helps in making decisions that are more consultative.
Electronic media and communication strategies
In the era of technology most of the companies are converging towards electronic media for
their communication. Digital communication strategies have been widely used within the
firm so as to ensure that they can reach to maximum numbers of stakeholders in a given time
period. This is also helpful for reducing the communicational gap which might arise within
the organisation between different levels of organisational structure. Since Red bull has its
business in different parts of the world hence use of electronic media for communication
among the different stakeholders becomes very much essential (Budíková, 2014). Electronic
media tools such as websites, social media platforms as well as new electronic mediums like
mobiles have been widely used by the organisations so as to communicate in an appropriate
manner.
Some of the widely used electronic media and communication strategies are:
 Social media strategy: This is a very common strategy that is used by the
organisations for their communication. In this strategy RedBull is using different
social media platforms so as to interact with their stakeholders especially their
customer. There are Red Bull official as well as fan pages where company is putting
their advertisement so as to communicate with their customers about their plans of the
future. This is also an excellent platform where Red Bull puts specifications of their
products so that everybody can know the problems they are facing. This
communication strategy is also used by the company so as to ask for feedbacks from
the customers in the form of comments. Companies respond according to the
feedbacks given by the consumers hence it is a slow but effective communicational
strategy. Twitter is used by the leaders of the organisation to do mass communication

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(Grohs and Reisinger, 2014). Leaders with their twitter handle interact with all their
stakeholders so as to reduce any kind of miscommunication and remove confusions
about the plans of the organisation for the future.
 Website: Websites also acts as an excellent communicational tool that Red Bull is
using for communicating things to their stakeholders. Most of the time it is used for
one way communication as the companies provides details about their business and
products over this websites. It is also used by their HR department for communicating
with the new talents.
 Mobile devices: Since the use of mobile technology has increase in past decade hence
the company is also suing this medium to interact with their stakeholders. There are
apps or other communicational methods that is used by the company so as to have a
direct interaction with the people. Since people carry these devices all the time hence
Red Bull can interact with them on the regular basis. Text messaging is highly used
mode of interaction through such kind of devices.
 E-Mails: This is one of the widely used strategies that are used by the organisations
such as Red bull for interacting with their stakeholders. This is used by the
organisation to interact with all the stakeholders and is highly used in the case of
internal stakeholders. E-mails have been used by the company’s management to
inform about something with their different stakeholders. This mode of
communication is very fast and helps the company to formalise its process of
communication. In the internal communication this is the most widely used strategy
by the company as any associated person within the company will be able to interact
with others. Both mass communication and person to person communication is
possible with the help of E-mails (Parente and Strausbaugh-Hutchinson, 2014).
 Blogs: It is seen that companies are using Blogs for interacting with their customers
and other stakeholders. This helps in giving any kind of descriptive information which
is very much necessary in the time when customers want to make purchases. There is
a dedicated team of blogger that does this for the company (Smillie and Blissett,
2010). Blogs helps in reducing the curiosity in the minds of the people and hence
increasing the chances of sales.
 Online TV ads: Red Bull is interacting with their customer by the help of online TV
advertisements. Online ads must be able to communicate with large numbers of
people. Since TV is watched by many people hence it has become essential for the

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organisations to improve the chances of sale. It is wonderful medium to interact with
targeted market segment.
SWOT analysis of Red Bull’s communication strategies
Red Bull takes use of different types of communicational strategies that helps a company in
improving in the flow of information within the organisation. In order to improve the base of
the organisational structure it is essential that company analyses its communicational
strategies. For this ding SWOT analysis can be beneficial:
Strengths:
 Higher use of technological mediums in the communicational process has increased
the effectiveness of the communicational channels.
 Dedicated team of people that are interacting with different stakeholders so as to clear
their doubts.
 Higher use of digital tools such as social media and other platforms for doing one way
communication (Herlé and Rustema, 2012).
 For implanting ideas and attract people company is taking use of different types of
multimedia for communication like video advertisements.
 Campaigns are used by the Red Bull to attract people and do their branding.
Weaknesses:
 Do not use local languages in their communication especially when it comes to
interacting with their customers.
 Its official website is not so effective from where communication with the
management can be easily done.
 Weak communicational skills at the leadership level especially when it comes to
number of interactions with the lower level staffs (Jothi, Neelamalar and Prasad,
2011).
 Poor two way communicational infrastructure.
 Not so effective organisational structure that might promote communication at the
highest of levels.
Opportunities

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 Interactive groups at different social media sites are one of the best platforms where
this company can extend.
 Mobile technologies such as App based communicational platforms are another area
where the company could move.
Threats
 With the increasing chances of data theft, communicational strategies used by the
company are under serious threat. This becomes higher in the case of digital media
strategies for communication as any leaks can lead to descaling of the communication
(Rogers, 2014).
 Too much communication can also waste the time of their sales and marketing team.
 Other competitors are advancing at much faster speed when it comes to aggressive
communicational plans.
Comparison of the communicational practice of the 2 competitors
Number of competitors in the energy drink industry is increasing and they are using different
types of communicational strategies so as to interact with all their stakeholders. Two major
competitors of Red Bull are Pepsico and Coca Cola.
Communicational practices of Coca-cola
Communicational strategy of Coca-cola aims to make the communicational structure in such
a manner that company is able to make easy flow of ideas within the organisation and make
better relationship with different stakeholders.
 Effective message strategy: Any message that is transmitted within the organisation is
controlled by few people. These people can access and comment on these messages
and they are present at different levels of the organisation. There is a high secrecy for
those that are meant for internal communication.
 Communication channels: They have used different channels that include telephone
extensions, emailing systems, emailing system, meetings and notice boards.
 Organisational culture and behaviour: Coca cola has supported culture that builds
open flow of ideas where everyone can interact with each other.

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 Brand management: They have invested high on the brand management and it will
help them in creating their brand image which has helped them in emotional
interaction with the people.
 Public relations: It is spending one of the highest amounts of money where they have
promised their consumers with high quality products. They have a strong PR team and
strategies that helps them in ensuring free exchange of information (Freeman, et al.
2014).
 Media management: The Company keeps posting some articles at different media
platforms which will help company in creating better links with its consumers.
Communication practices at Pepsico
Some of the efficient practices at Pepsico are illustrated below:
 Dividing responsibility: Company has divided responsibilities in such a manner that
their remains no restrictions in the flow of ideas. There are people at different levels
of the organisation who are responsible for managing the communicational structure
within the firm (Raupp and Hoffjann, 2012).
 Providing feedbacks: Anybody in the organisation can provide feedbacks to others.
This helps in supporting each other so as to improve the whole communicational
levels within the organisation.
 New structure: There is continuous change in the communicational structure of the
organisation so as to make cohesive corporate strategy and more readily respond to
each other’s ideas.
 Digital revamping: Apart from intranet, their own website and relaunched their
capabilities with the help of podcast to blogs which enable its several thousand
associates to get aware about what is happening in the industry.
 Global meetings: Company conducts meetings at the global level by taking help of the
global calls. Conference calls have been widely used within the organisation.
 Compared to the practices related to communication in these companies Red Bull has
bit different communication strategies. Their practice includes:
 Sales promotions: They are promoting various events especially endorses sports
events. At such events they interact with the audience present there. Product launch
events have been their major strategies for promoting their products (Dumitrescu and
Vinerean, 2010).

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 Cinema and different advertising: They are producing advertisements for showing it
in between the cinemas. Radio broadcasting, TV broadcasting, printing
advertisements, poster and billboards along with social media are used for external
communication.
 Cultural changes: They have created a culture within the firm where everyone is free
to share their ideas freely.
Recommendation for improving communication at Red Bull
Communication at Red Bull is on the higher standards but still there are some changes that
are required within the organisation. It is recommended that company should focus on app
based services where they can communicate with their stakeholders. It is essential that
company adopts advancements in blog posts so that it can explain their ideas to most of the
people. Apart from this, company has to understand that cumulative communication where
everybody can share ideas freely is essential (Yzer, Southwell and Stephenson, 2012). It is
also recommended that company utilises different data protection strategies so that leaks in
the communication can be reduced. Like Coca-cola they will have to improve their image as
there are some negative aspects related to the energy drink that is produced by Red Bull.
Leaders will have to take initiatives for improving their communication with different types
of stakeholders. Since the company is highly dependent on its suppliers for its business in
many countries hence the company should do global meet and conferences that helps in
making better communication with the suppliers.
In order to further improve the communication at the organisation company should strengthen
their intranet facilities. This will help them in ensuring higher levels of security while
transferring information from one level to another. They should learn from Coca-cola for
introducing the policies related to the messaging and they must bring effective message
strategy. This will help in ensuring that data can be checked before being sent (Jones, 2017).
This is necessary in the modern times where any confusion or miscommunication can lead to
failures or can create discontent in the minds of the people. It is also recommended that
company should assign communicational heads at each levels of the organisation.
CONCLUSION
From the above based report, it can be concluded that Red Bull is a highly successful
company and should focus on the communication strategy as the war of communication has

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gone on the higher side. Invoices, Flowcharts, and Verbal communication are some of the
non-electronic communication strategies used by Red Bull so as to interact with internal and
external stakeholders. Social media, Website, E-Mails, Blogs and Online TV ads are some of
the electronic communication strategies used by Red Bull so as to reach to maximum possible
customers. Their strength lies in the brand name and use of advertisements while their
weakness is that they not utilised internet communication channels at optimum levels.

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