Well, traditional advertising agency led marketing focuses on resource intensive launches e.g. media buying, expensive campaigns and in-store promotions, which produce a tangible but very short-lived spike in sales and brand awareness because there is limited emotional engagement. By contrast, Monster operates under a “waste not, want not” credo, investing all of its resources into cultivating brand love by converting their target market into fans who then go on to influence and recruit mainstream customers.
Monster’s success lies in its ability to get the right people on board and to leverage those people’s own networks to create influence within the markets they target. In other words Monster found their ecosystem.
Ecosystems are natural, authentic networks based on real-world scenes. Each ecosystem has its own protocol, from the language used to the clothes worn. These networks possess a code often hidden to the outsider that reinforces social dynamics like who’s “in”, who’s “out” and who the key influencers are. Wherever your people already have networks is where you need to start building your brand.
The Monster ecosystem lives within the Motorsports, Action Sports, E-Gaming and Punk Rock scenes. These are shared with Red Bull, but Monster brings a more aggressive, rebellious and edgy personality to life. They realised this early on and made a concerted effort to curate a marketing team of people who dwelled within these ecosystems – from journalists to artists and ex-athletes.
As its manifesto says on its Facebook page: “At Monster, all of our guys walk the walk in action sports, punk rock music, partying, hangin’ with the girls and living life on the edge. Monster is way more than an energy drink. Led by our athletes, musicians, employees, distributors and fans, Monster is a lifestyle in a can!”
