The song was originally co-written by Clifford Lane with Mary Wood as a jingle for PepsiCo's "GeneratioNext" advertising campaign and used in television ads released in January 1997.

Through Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO, the Spice Girls signed an endorsement deal with Pepsi in early 1997, that consisted of the release of an exclusive CD single, TV commercials, on-can and bottle promotion and the group's first live concerts in Turkey.

The inclusion of "Move Over" as a track on Spiceworld garnered divisive opinions from music critics, while the song itself received a mixed reception for its production and lyrical content.

[5][11] From the beginning of the Spice Girls, Fuller envisioned the group as their own particular brand, and soon after, they became involved in an unprecedented marketing phenomenon that led to a prolific number of merchandise and sponsorship deals,[12][13] a situation that at the time "proved ground-breaking" in pop music.

Brian Swette, executive vice president and chief marketing officer at Pepsi, described the characters in it as "positive, in control and lay claim to the future—the antithesis of Generation X".

'"[21] The lyrics of the song mock past musical styles such as "rave, rap, punk, metal" urging listeners to not "do it over, cause that's over", while embracing the "next page, next stage, next craze, next wave".

[22] The complete un-edited two-minutes 46-seconds version of the song, was officially unveiled on 6 October 1997, during a press conference in Granada, Spain,[23][24] as the sixth track of the group's second studio album Spiceworld,[25] set to be released on 3 November 1997.

[9] The album credits Wood, Lane and the Spice Girls as writers and the songwriting team Richard "Biff" Stannard and Matt Rowe as the producers of the song.

[27][28] David Sinclair of The Times characterized the song as a "Joan Jett-ish pop-rock anthem",[29] while the Chicago Tribune's Greg Kot described it as "bubblegum industrial rock".

[37][41] The sponsorship deal signed between Pepsi and the Spice Girls consisted of the release of 30-second television ads, on-can and bottle promotion featuring pictures of the group and their first live concerts,[42] reportedly worth £1 million.

"[18] As part of the deal, British advertising agency Claydon Heeley International devised the release of "Step to Me" during the summer of 1997, an exclusive CD single only available to customers who had collected 20 pink ring pull tabs from promotional Pepsi cans,[42] not accessible through traditional retailers.

[46] An accompanying extensive campaign also ran in the British national and regional press, teen magazines and radio ads on Capital FM's the Pepsi Chart Show.

[15] The ads featured the group throwing cans in the air, as well as singing and dancing to the song while gyrating around buildings with a silver backdrop containing the Pepsi logo.

[15][43] On 12–13 October 1997, the Spice Girls performed two live concerts in Istanbul, Turkey, a location chosen because it was one of the most important marketing drive areas for Pepsi.

Britvic, Pepsi's UK franchise holder, estimated that between 450,000 and 600,000 CDs of "Step to Me" were redeemed during the campaign, becoming the most successful on-pack promotion in the history of the British soft-drink market.

[53] Similar to the previous deal, it offered consumers the chance to collect exclusive live CDs by the Spice Girls and three other acts, Coolio, Hanson and Eternal, by gathering 18 ring pull tabs from Pepsi cans.

[58] David Wild of Rolling Stone magazine's had a more positive opinion, calling the track "a nifty cross-promotion of a song",[59] while Deborah J. Wolfinsohn of the Austin American-Statesman characterized the collaboration as "a bizarre and thoroughly modern sensation".

[60] In a review of the group's entire catalogue, Vulture.com's Anne T. Donahue placed the track as their sixth best song, describing it as "an anthem so powerful it inspired countless listeners [...] to abandon Coke for Pepsi".

[23] Edna Gundersen, writing for USA Today, had a more critical view of the song, calling it a "tiresome chant that goads 'generation next'" and pointed it out as an example of the album's "stream of cliched 'Girl Power' pep talks".

For the performance, the group returned to the stage after a small break, wearing silver boilersuits while the background screens showed visuals of the Pepsi logo.