M&M's - The sweetest communication strategies

We all know that M&M's are the most joyful chocolate candies in the entire world. What many consumers don’t know is the fact that, historically speaking, M&M's are candies that have been around for more than half of a century. Who would have guessed that the idea for M&M’s Milk Chocolate Candies was hatched against the backdrop of the Spanish Civil War? Legend has it that, while on a trip to Spain, Forrest Mars Sr. encountered soldiers who were eating pellets of chocolate encased in a hard sugary coating.  Inspired by this idea, Mr. Mars went back to his kitchen and invented the recipe for M&M’s Milk Chocolate Candies.

The communication campaigns for M&M's have always placed the focus on the intangible attributes of the brand and not on the tangible ones. If we take the case of Kinder Bueno, for instance, we will notice that the brand positions itself different from M&M's. While the former uses communication to convey the product attributes, the later appeals to other positioning strategy, which is creating a story behind the brand. As a result, the consumers all around the world do not choose M&M's only due to its taste, but because of the assets of the brand: it is joyful, happy, makes you laugh, you want to share it with your friends.

So M&M's tries to create a sense of ownership for its target groups, to make them feel part of a community, but not a community like any others. The M&M's community is for those with a developed sense of humor, who appreciate the irony and try not to take things too seriously (only when it is needed).

One of the main characteristics of the M&M's communication campaigns is that they are unitary and consistent without being boring, and this ad is not an exception. M&M's has developed some strong brand assets, which make it visible and popular. I am sure that consumers do not need to see the logo on the ad to know that it’s from M&M's (the brand identity is conveyed through the specific colours, shape and size of the candies).

Moreover, the slogan ’’Communication just got sweeter’’ also emphasizes that the brand chose a different positioning strategy from the competitors, and that M&aM's is not just a chocolate candy delight among other brands, but it’s the brand that makes its audiences’ life sweeter, bringing a little bit of colour and joy in their daily routine. For the M&aM’s target, the brand is an attempt to escape from the seriousness and monotony of life and to enjoy it to its smallest details.

Andra Androniciuc