BUSI 520 Week 7 MMGP: Promotions/Marketing Example

Marketing Management Group Project, Promotions and Socially Responsible Marketing: Liquid Death

Questions Addressed

• How does the brand promote its product, and how well integrated are its communications?
• How socially responsible is its marketing?

The Communications Mix

Kotler and Keller (2016) describe eight major modes of marketing communication: advertising, sales promotion, events and experiences, public relations and publicity, online and social media marketing, mobile marketing, direct and database marketing, and personal selling. Liquid Death uses nearly all of them, but its weight is unusual. Its most important channel has been online and social media. The brand was born online: its first marketing was a tiny-budget video released before any water had shipped, and its audience on video platforms now runs into the millions, with TikTok its largest channel (Clark, 2025; Kirichanskaya, 2024). Its content mocks the conventions of beverage advertising and wellness messaging, and it is made to be shared rather than simply watched.

Events and experiences come next. The partnership with Live Nation gives the brand exclusive water status across a festival and concert calendar numbering well over a hundred events, which puts the can in the hands of the core segments at exactly the moments the brand is built for (Clark, 2025). Collaborations function as publicity: a makeup collection created with e.l.f. Cosmetics sold out within an hour and drew attention well beyond the beverage category (Kirichanskaya, 2024). Personal selling is directed at the trade, distributors and retail buyers, whose support the services section discussed. Sales promotion is used sparingly, consistent with the pricing section's argument that discounts would erode the premium.

The elements are well integrated, and the integration is visible from the can outward. Every channel carries the same irreverent voice, the same imagery and the same anti-plastic message, so each exposure reinforces the others. The packaging itself functions as advertising: a tallboy can with a skull on it, carried through a festival crowd, is seen by far more people than the one who bought it. Kotler and Keller (2016) describe integration as coordinating the modes to create a consistent message and to maximize their combined effect, and Liquid Death's consistency is one of its strengths.

Why Word of Mouth Carries the Brand

The brand gets far more visibility than its traditional advertising would buy, because its content is designed to be shared. Trusov et al. (2009) tracked how a social networking site gained members and compared referrals from existing users with the site's paid and earned media; the referrals kept producing sign-ups for weeks longer, and each additional referral was worth far more than an additional media appearance or event. Liquid Death has, in effect, built a communications mix in which its fans are the main medium. The risk of that model is that fans' enthusiasm cannot be bought or scheduled, so the brand must keep producing content worth sharing. The economics are attractive while the content works: a video that fans pass along costs the same to make whether ten thousand or ten million people see it. But the model also concentrates risk in a single capability, the creative team's ability to surprise an audience that has grown used to being surprised. As the brand ages, jokes that once felt fresh can start to feel formulaic, and the share rate that made the model cheap can fall without warning. A brand that depends on earned attention must budget for the day when it has to pay for attention instead.

Socially Responsible Marketing

Kotler and Keller (2016) argue that holistic marketing includes social responsibility marketing, attending to the legal, ethical and community consequences of marketing activity. Two aspects of Liquid Death's marketing deserve scrutiny.

The first is its environmental message. The brand presents its aluminum cans as an alternative to plastic bottles. Aluminum can be recycled repeatedly, but whether a can is better for the environment than a plastic bottle depends on how it is made, how far it travels and whether it is in fact recycled. The Federal Trade Commission's Green Guides warn marketers against broad, unqualified environmental benefit claims, which are difficult to substantiate, and say that recyclability claims should be qualified when recycling facilities are not available to a substantial majority of consumers (Federal Trade Commission, 2012). Delmas and Burbano (2011) describe greenwashing as the intersection of poor environmental performance and positive communication about it, and identify vague, unverifiable claims as a common driver. The group's assessment is that Liquid Death's anti-plastic message is plausible but would be stronger and safer if paired with specific, verifiable figures, such as the recycled content of its cans and the results of any lifecycle studies.

The second is its humor. Dark jokes about death and violence fit the brand's adult audience, but social platforms and stores also reach children. Water is a healthy product, which reduces the concern compared with sugary drinks, but content that glamorizes violence for laughs raises a fair question about who sees it. Research on sustainable consumption also suggests that the tone of a message matters. White et al. (2019) found that sustainable behavior is encouraged by social influence, habit formation, individual self-concept, feelings and cognition, and tangibility, and the brand's humor taps the social and self-concept routes effectively.

Recommendations

The group recommends three changes. First, add specific, verifiable environmental information to the website and packaging, so the anti-plastic message rests on facts. Second, adopt and publish content guidelines for platforms with large young audiences. Third, keep investing in shareable content and events rather than traditional advertising, since word of mouth is the brand's most effective medium. These recommendations will be carried into the group's final report.

References

Clark, B. (2025, July 22). MicroVentures' portfolio company: Liquid Death's history and milestones. MicroVentures. https://microventures.com/microventures-portfolio-company-liquid-death-history-and-milestones

Delmas, M. A., & Burbano, V. C. (2011). The drivers of greenwashing. California Management Review, 54(1), 64-87. https://doi.org/10.1525/cmr.2011.54.1.64

Federal Trade Commission. (2012). Guides for the use of environmental marketing claims (16 C.F.R. Part 260). https://www.ftc.gov/legal-library/browse/rules/guides-use-environmental-marketing-claims-green-guides

Kirichanskaya, N. (2024, May 16). 'We are still in the early innings': Liquid Death's SVP of strategy. Inside FMCG. https://insidefmcg.com.au/2024/05/16/we-are-still-in-the-early-innings-liquid-deaths-svp-of-strategy/

Kotler, P., & Keller, K. L. (2016). Marketing management (15th ed.). Pearson.

Trusov, M., Bucklin, R. E., & Pauwels, K. (2009). Effects of word-of-mouth versus traditional marketing: Findings from an internet social networking site. Journal of Marketing, 73(5), 90-102. https://doi.org/10.1509/jmkg.73.5.90

White, K., Habib, R., & Hardisty, D. J. (2019). How to SHIFT consumer behaviors to be more sustainable: A literature review and guiding framework. Journal of Marketing, 83(3), 22-49. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022242919825649