Coca-Cola Co. is taking its long-term partnership with the World Wildlife Fund mobile in a text-to-donate promotion.

To participate, consumers can text product-specific short codes to a keyword to donate money towards the Arctic Home fund, which is an organization created by Coca-Cola and the WWF to save polar bears. The campaign is running until March and includes a mix of digital, broadcast and mobile initiatives.

?Our primary goal with Arctic Home is to expand awareness and generate funds to help protect the polar bear and its habitat,? said Peter Callaro, group director of integrated marketing content at Coca-Cola, Atlanta.

?Funds raised through Arctic Home will support WWF?s efforts to protect the polar bear?s home through research, local knowledge collection and community-based partnerships,? he said.

Cool codes
The codes for donating are found on select Coca-Cola cans and bottles, which are identified with white packaging.

Users can then text the keyword found on packaging to the short code 357357 to donate $1 towards the Arctic Home foundation.

The donation is automatically added to consumers? monthly bills via their carrier.

Coca-Cola is matching each dollar donated up to $1 million, and the company kicked off the campaign with a $2 million donation.

In addition to mobile donations, consumers can also donate on the Web site for the program - www.arctichome.com ? with a credit card.

The campaign also involves a special-edition iPhone application where users can learn more about the Arctic Home program and donate to the cause.

App users can also challenge friends to games, collect points and compete to win prizes, including tablets and a grand prize trip to the Arctic.

The campaign is also being promoted via television commercials.

According to the fund?s Web site, more than $16,000 has been raised so far for Artic Home.

?The WWF is always looking for creative ways to get people engaged and stay up with trends that are environmentally-friendly, which this campaign is an example of because it involves only remote donation,? said Nick Conger, spokesman for WWF, Washington.

Mobile branding
The WWF and Coca-Cola have had an ongoing partnership since 2007 and have worked together on similar environmental issues, including one advocating for freshwater protection.

However, the newest campaign focuses on Coca-Cola?s most famous symbol ? the polar bear.

Polar bears have been a staple of Coca-Cola?s marketing efforts since 1922.

By partnering with the WWF and using polar bears as the message behind the Arctic Home, Coca-Cola is able to raise awareness of the cause while putting the Coca-Cola message at the forefront of the campaign.

In addition to this initiative, Coca-Cola has a number of other mobile initiatives.

Most recently, the company revealed that they would be tapping into mobile payments with NFC-enabled vending machines (see story).

?We look at all the different ways we can communicate with our fans,? said Coca-Cola?s Mr. Callaro.

?We tap all the resources we have available from traditional, to mobile, to in-store, to out-of-home, to online,? he said.

?We believe this 360-degree approach is essential to efficient marketing and awareness-driving efforts.?

Final Take
Lauren Johnson is editorial assistant on Mobile Marketer, New York