In the world of marketing, consumers are constantly exposed to and offered a wide range of products offered by different companies who are fighting capture the the largest portion of their targeted market. Thus, companies are constantly trying to strand out amongst their competitors, create a niche for themselves and differentiate their brand. And how do they do this? One growingly popular strategy of colour association. Visual information is very often related to colour and this explains why consciously or unconsciously, we associate distinctive colours to certain products. For example green is associated with Starbucks, red is associated to Coca Cola, yellow and blue is associated to IKEA and so on. Of course, there are not enough colours in the world for each company to claim its own colour association and so, firms are beginning to turn to the legal system to claim their rights to a colour.

A great example of another company that has can be found on the Brand Channel’s blog post on how Cadbury, the well known British chocolate company has recently successfully registered purple (Pantone 2865c to be specific) as their trademark colour (on chocolate products only). Though Cadbury strongly believed in the colour as a powerful identification of their brand, it was definitely a legal struggle with competitors such as Nestle retaliating against this patent.

This seven year long fight Cadbury has put up was for good reason as it has essentially protected their brand image. As Christopher Wadlow, Ph.D. proposes in his book, The Law of Passing-off: Unfair Competition by Misrepresentation, “colours operate as powerful stimulants of memory, identification and loyalty” (2004). In light of this, Cadbury’s purpose is to take advantage of this powerful stimulate and claim the colour as officially theirs in the market. Their main concern was to ensure that it can be easily distinguished even by children too young to read. In doing so, they are eliminating having consumers mistakingly pick up the “fake” Cadbury chocolate bar wrapped in purple due to products of strikingly similar packaging in terms of colour, logo and text being shelved on the same shelf.

Cadbury is only one of the few companies that has jumped on the colour patenting bandwagon. Leading brands of the colour trademarking include Tiffany & Co.’s colour Tiffany Blue and T-Mobile’s colour magenta. While gaining the rights to a colour still remains to be a painfully long and difficult process, companies are realizing the importance of claiming their colour in order to protect their brand image.

McDonalds, the largest chain of fast food restaurants with its distinguished golden arch situated in a total of 119 countries, serving up to 64 million people around the globe daily. Adding onto Ramona Chung’s post on how this corporate franchise is as successful as it is, I find there’s more to it than its appeal to children and sponsorship for the Olympics (though those are undoubtedly factors that contribute to the success of McDonald’s).

Observing from McDonald’s ad campaigns, it is evident that the corporation segments it markets and caters their marketing to each one differently. What I can draw from their ads, they have four  general segments: Children (demographic), adults (demographic), athletes/healthy lifestyle (psychographic), and regional (geographic).

McDonald’s definitely has a strong market hold for younger kids with the novel Happy Meals and the toys that come with it, along with the in restaurant Play Places; its hard to find a child that doesn’t enjoy the McDonald’s experience. I know for me, as a kid, going to McDonald’s was always an exciting treat. Here’s an example of a Japanese McDonald’s commercial for kids in which the ad emphasizes the enthusiasm and excitement attributed to McDonald’s (it’s one of my favourites!)

Then there are the adults for which McDonald’s gears its ads to highlight the availability and convenience it offers.
An example of this is one that parents of new born babies can appreciate. In this case, McDonalds its really getting at identifying and fulfilling the needs of consumers.

And finally with McDonald’s prominent affiliation with the Olympics, there are (seemingly) health conscious food alternatives (offering new products such as at the McGrill and various types of salads) and ad campaigns for the active lifestyle group. When their ads feature world class athletes, consumer behaviour is effected through the social factor in which these endorsors become opinion leaders within their reference groups.

An additional segment I noticed with McDonald’s is its demographic focus. With locations all over the world, the corporation is placing themselves within hundreds of different cultures and the regular hamburger and fries that thrives in North American won’t necessarily fit the tastes for people in places such as India or Egypt. Thus, they strategically of localize products and promote them in order to effectively fit the needs of these different regions. For instance, in Singapore, a popular menu item is the McRice where burger buns are replaced for fried rice patties and in India, they offer the McCurry Pan.

Evidently, this powerhouse has gained its credit and success largely through its marketing and ability to effectively segment and target their desired markets and position themselves as the leading fast food restaurant in the industry.

Sources:
http://www.aboutmcdonalds.com/etc/medialib/aboutMcDonalds/investor_relations3.Par.56096.File.dat/2010%20Annual%20Report%20(print).pdf