Coca-Cola says contextually relevant advertising and partnerships are working after reporting better-than-expected revenue in the second quarter.

The company said it brought in $12.62 billion USD in revenue, slightly above the $12.54 billion projected by analysts, even as North American volume shrank slightly for its Coca-Cola trademark brand.

Coca-Cola Zero, Diet Coke, Bodyarmor and Fanta – a brand that recently expanded its footprint in Canada with the launch of a strawberry innovation – each reported increases in sales volume, the company said.

In Tuesday’s earnings call, James Quincey, chairman and CEO of the Coca-Cola Company said “pockets of consumer pressure” were countered by uplifting consumer connections through brand-led marketing, citing in-store and package messaging in particular.

Quincey said Coca-Cola’s marketing has undergone a “transformation” through digitization, segmentation and efficiency, adding that consumer engagement has been fuelled in part by the global relaunch of the “Share a Coke” campaign, which tapped into nostalgia with sharable personalized bottles and cans.

Rolled out across the trademark Coca-Cola portfolio and amplified by connected packaging, the campaign activated in the spring with approximately 10 billion bottles and cans in more than 120 countries with more 30,000 names tailored to local markets.

Coke Zero, a product included in Coca-Cola’s recent Star Wars LTO, achieved double-digit volume growth (14%) for the fourth consecutive quarter.

In North America, the company also recently launched the “This is My Taste” campaign for Diet Coke, inspired by social-media insights showing that consumers use a distinctive language, like “crispy” taste, to express their connection to the brand.

The campaign contributed to growth in the quarter, marking Diet Coke’s fourth consecutive quarter of volume growth in North America.

Revamping and creating new campaigns has been a key part of Coca-Cola’s investment in its brands, Quincey says.

Earlier this spring, Coca-Cola brand Minute Maid launch its “Bring the Juice” platform as the official juice of WWE, with in-store activations to drive interest in live-event contesting for the Survivor Series event.

Quincey also called out the success of the recently launched TikTok-inspired Sprite+Tea innovation, which the company says increased share of shelf inventory for the quarter.

The line added to “recent hits under the Sprite trademark,” Quincey said, adding that Sprite+Tea has earned positive social-media reaction since being launched as an “experimental project.”

In the Mexican market, Coca-Cola is leaning further into consumer passion points, particularly for the World Cup and a very popular contest initiative. Strong local executions led to a boost in consumer perception scores in Mexico.