Advertising Deep Dive: Hydration Beverage & Powdered Drinks Industry

Key Takeaways

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Hydration Beverage Industry:

Advertising Focus — Social Ads:

• Top Advertising Channel: Social ads, which represent 54% of total spend
• Top Social Ad Channel: Facebook
• Facebook targeting: Predominantly females who reside in Los Angeles, Greensboro, and New York
  

Advertising Leader — Drink Hint: Hint is the leader in advertising spend in the beverage category, spending a total of $5.3M between January 2020 and January 2021. Hint ramped up advertising spend in January 2021 when they launched a “36 Bottles for $36” campaign showcasing their low price value. 

Powdered Drinks  Industry:

Advertising Focus — Social Ads:

• Top Advertising Channel: Social ads, which represent 77% of total spend
• Top Social Ad Channel: Facebook
• Facebook targeting: Slightly skewed towards  females who reside in Los Angeles, New York, and Chicago
  Advertising Leader— Liquid I.V: Liquid I.V. is the leader in advertising spend in the powdered drinks category, spending a total of $8M between January 2020 and January 2021. Their top campaign was the “IMMUNITY25” promo code campaign that gave users 25% off their products.

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Brands analyzed in this case study:

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Between January 2020 to January 2021, brands in the powdered drinks category have spent +21% on advertising compared to brands in the beverage category.

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The beverage category has a fairly even distribution amongst the advertising channels, with social making up 54% of total spend, followed by search (32%).

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For Facebook ads targeting, the beverages category focuses mainly on advertising to females who reside in Los Angeles (13%), Greensboro (6.5%), and New York (5.75%).

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Aside from branded keywords (e.g., “brand name” + product), the most commonly used paid keywords are variations of “flavored water”. Top search ads focus on online delivery and free shipping promotions.

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Hint is the dominant brand when it comes to display ads—roughly 19% of all display ad spend comes from Hint (~$1.5M for the time period).

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Diving deeper into individual brands, Drink Hint is the leader in advertising spending in this category—spending a total of $5.3M between January 2020 and January 2021.

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In September, Hint shifted their focus from Instagram ads to Facebook and Display.

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In January 2021, Hint ramped up advertising spend, with a +191% increase in both Facebook and desktop display for their “36 Bottles for $36” campaign.

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Although Hint had run this campaign before, this time, Hint aggressively marketed their $1 price point, highlighting this message throughout all their creatives.

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During the same time, Hint re-ran several brand awareness campaigns, one featuring an article feature on today.com and one for their Alzheimer's awareness initiative.

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A common theme that occurs in Hint’s ads, regardless of the campaign type, is their emphasis on their product flavour range.

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For the Powder category, 77% of total ad spend is being allocated towards social ads, with Facebook having the highest spend at $7.8M.

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For Facebook ads targeting, the powdered drinks category focuses mainly on advertising in metropolitan cities such as Los Angeles (5.75%), New York (4.50%), and Chicago (3.75%).

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“Electrolytes” is the most commonly bid on search term, along with variations of “(description) + electrolytes”.

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Display ad spending is more evenly split amongst competitors in the powdered drinks category, with food-based websites being the most popular target sites.

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The spending leader for this category is Liquid I.V., with a total of $8M total spend between January 2020 and January 2021.

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Liquid I.V. focuses their advertising efforts mainly on Facebook and Instagram, spending heavily on heavy customer acquisition campaigns (via deals and promotions).

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Their top Facebook campaign for this time period was their “IMMUNITY25” promotion that gave users 25% off Liquid I.V. products.

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Another notable Facebook campaign was a series of ads that called out Liquid I.V.’s product availability at Costco.

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The brand also promoted the campaign on Instagram, but rather than using product stills, they ran a video ad that targeted a male, fitness-inclined audience.