2015 winner: Guinness, Global Marketing - case study

In 2011, Guinness was a global brand in terms of its footprint, but very little else. They faced a number of complex challenges. They have many different audiences in different markets. Guinness have vastly different product formats across the world. They were supporting five different positionings across the globe. And each market presented a unique set of challenges.

Guinness needed to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of their marketing around the world. They believed that creating one global platform would allow them to create marketing activity that could be shared to create economies of scale and raise the overall quality of what they do. But the solution would need to be flexible enough for each market to address their specific objectives. And Guiness wanted that platform to deliver the same cultural fame and creative brilliance that Guinness has become known for.

The solution was to create ‘Made of More’- an idea that champions those who have the confidence to carve their own path. For the first time, Guinness had an idea that could work across geographies and was equally powerful as an activation, as it is an ad. Whether that was moving stories of mate ship in North America, a rallying cry for a new creative generation in Nigeria, a celebration of Congolese swag in Western Europe, or a springboard for product innovation.

Across time, this has allowed Guinness to achieve our global objectives, deliver an impressive ROI, win many creative awards, and create cultural traction for the brand. The lesson for other marketers? Guinness' philosophy has been to take a ‘Glocal’ approach. Creating marketing activity that has global synergies that allow them to apply local insight and flavour. And in turn, they have created a ‘Global Superbrand’ to match the ‘Global Iconic Status’ of the Guinness product.

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