Brands are always on the hunt for new audiences.
At ADWEEK’s Mediaweek event in New York last week, executives from Coca-Cola’s Bodyarmor Sports Nutrition and news publisher The Shade Room discussed how they’re expanding their audiences by working with influencers and staying on top of changes to content distribution on social platforms.
As a sports drink, BodyArmor has traditionally leaned into athletes as spokespeople. But increasingly, its testing out influencers and media partnerships beyond its core demographic, said chief marketing officer Tom Gargiulo.
“In the past, we’ve been very much reliant on leveraging our athletes to be our core influencers—we still do that, and it’s still a very important part of our strategy,” he said. “But we’ve invested a lot more in influencer marketing and microinfluencers—people that can create that connection with our consumers.”
Branded products
In one example, Gargiulo cited a partnership with sports creator team Dude Perfect to target younger consumers.
Bodyarmor works with Dude Perfect to create content. This year, it co-branded a product with the group to launch two new flavors: a cherry and berry-flavored drink and pineapple lemonade. It was Bodyarmor’s first collaboration with an outside company to develop new flavors, and more than three million products were sold, Gargiulo said.
“The way we want to activate our brand is through their lens,” he said of the partnership.
In another example, Bodyarmor zeros in on sports fans through a partnership with Barstool Sports that includes integrating products into the media company’s shows and social media accounts.
“They’ve been a long-standing partner, but over the last couple of years, we’ve really doubled down on our relationship with them,” Gargiulo said.
Bodyarmor is also finding ways to reach pockets of more niche audiences that might be a target for its products. For example, 8% of the brand’s consumers are new moms who need to hydrate after giving birth. Travelers are another non-sports group that use Bodyarmor’s products to hydrate.
Bodyarmor is gearing up for a big brand refresh in 2025 that “touches all aspects of [the] marketing mix,” Gargiulo said.
Platform changes for publishers
Angie Nwandu, CEO and founder of The Shade Room, said that as a publisher, one of her big priorities is staying on top of algorithm and product changes on social platforms that impact how people access content. For example, Instagram now heavily prioritizes videos.