Marketing Strategy and SWOT Analysis of KitKat

Everyone, at least once in their life, has tried those crispy wafers covered with chocolate called Kit Kats. Even if you’ve never tried them, you surely have watched its advertisement “Have a break, have a KitKat.” KitKat has more than 350 gourmet flavors, most of which are produced in Japan. These flavors revitalize the brand’s offerings and create strong customer relationships. But are the slogan and various flavors what make the brand so lovable? To better understand the reasons behind Kit Kat’s continuous growth, let’s go through its marketing strategy and SWOT analysis.

To begin with, let’s analyze the company’s goals, objectives and desired future position. 

Mission Statement of Kitkat

Nestle’s mission statement is “the world’s leading nutrition, health, and wellness company. Our mission of “Good Food, Good Life” is to provide consumers with the best tasting, most nutritious choices in a wide range of food and beverage categories and eating occasions, from morning to night.”

This statement shows that Nestle gives priority to customer experience and especially highlights the nutritional value of its products. The company has worked hard to ensure that all the products satisfy minimum health standards to improve people’s quality of life and protect them from contamination.

Vision Statement of Kitkat

Nestle’s vision statement is “to be a leading, competitive, Nutrition, Health and Wellness Company delivering improved shareholder value by being a preferred corporate citizen, preferred employer, preferred supplier selling preferred products.” 

This statement indicates that Nestle sees itself as a company delivering shareholder value via profitable long-term growth while remaining essential and fully accountable in the social, economic, and environmental segments. It also has a vision to lead a dynamic and professional workforce. 

Now it is time to understand what positioning strategy Kit Kat uses for branding.

For this matter, let’s explore the following post from the company’s Instagram page:

With about one million followers on Instagram, KitKat keeps its customers updated and always on check to remind them about the necessary “break.” In this Instagram post, we observe a word game where the word “break” can mean two things.

In one case, Kit Kat encourages people to literally break the glass while it can also mean to have a break and have a Kit Kat in case of emergency. Having a daily break is an everyday activity that connects people around a piece of chocolate-covered wafer. 

While people comment that every day is an emergency, that only leaves us with one conclusion, Kit Kat belongs to Everyman Brand Archetype.

So, what do we know about the Everyman Brand Archetype?

Desire: Connection to others.

Aim: Belonging and fitting in.

Strategy: developing ordinary solid virtues, getting on with or appeal to ordinary people, and blending in.

Here are the messaging levels of Everyman Brand Archetype. 

Level One: Being lonely and alienating, experiencing an orphan-like feeling.

Level Two: Seeking affiliation, driven by the feeling of loneliness.

Level Three: Learning to connect and fit in, making friends, and accepting support.

Level Four: Becoming the humanitarian, realizing, and practicing for the dignity afforded to everyone despite their differences.

The Everyman Archetype provides a proper identity for brands:

• That are produced in a company with down-home culture.
• That are commonly used every day.
• Whose products/services make people feel like they belong.
• That have a moderate to low pricing.

Brand Archetypes. Why do we need them in practice?

Our communication strategy may have multiple messaging approaches. But there is some logic that unifies all these and it is called communication based on the archetypal branding. A company may have many messages, but they do not have something in common. For example “Do everything easily”, “Go ahead and be powerful” or Dig deeper and be experienced”.

These 3 quotes have different goals and bring different subconscious effects. One is about Being a Hero, another is about gaining more experience. These are 2 different directions of messaging and the logics of Brand archetypes bring more uniqueness and clearness here. Just read the book “8 steps to a complete archetypal branding” and you will have more experience in communication based on archetypes.

Brand Archetypes. Why do we need them in practice?

Our communication strategy may have multiple messaging approaches. But there is some logic that unifies all these and it is called communication based on the archetypal branding. A company may have many messages, but they do not have something in common. For example “Do everything easily”, “Go ahead and be powerful” or Dig deeper and be experienced”.

These 3 quotes have different goals and bring different subconscious effects. One is about Being a Hero, another is about gaining more experience. These are 2 different directions of messaging and the logics of Brand archetypes bring more uniqueness and clearness here. Just read the book “8 steps to a complete archetypal branding” and you will have more experience in communication based on archetypes.

Moving on, let’s have a look at the SWOT analysis of Kit Kat

Strengths

Unique Offering: One of Kit Kat’s primary competitive advantages is its unique product. The chocolate-covered wafer is one of its kind and is loved by many. By the product that Kit Kat offers, it differentiates itself from notable brands like Dairy Milk. 

Nestle Brand: Kit Kat is owned by Nestle, which has an extensive market share around the globe. Since Nestle is recognized in all parts of the world, this automatically makes Kit Kat known too.

Strong Tagline: Kit Kat has a simple yet visible slogan that creates brand awareness. “Have a break, have a Kit Kat” slogan led to a major hype both among adults and children.

Distribution: The brand has massive distribution and delivers products to 16 countries in the world. Additionally, more than 100 countries have production of Kit Kat. This leads to a boost in sales on behalf of the sales channel that Kit Kat belongs to.

Weaknesses 

Duplicates: One major weakness for Kit Kat is the problem with a four-dimensional wafer. Some brands come up with the chocolate wafer biscuit concept, while others are just duplicates. This means that Kit Kat has to fight such duplication continually

Breakage: Since Kit Kats are made of wafers, it breaks easily, so a lot of times, the consumer receives a broken chocolate Kit Kat bar. This leads to dissatisfied customers, thus, a decrease in sales.

Packaging: For about sixty years, Kit Kat has not changed its packaging. Only some minor changes have been made to the red packaging, merchandising, and sales promotion of the chocolate. In order to keep customers interested all the time, it is crucial to come up with innovative ideas and go for what’s new and trendy. 

Corporate Social Responsibility: Kit Kat has been known for its weak implementation of corporate social responsibility programs and, thus, received a lot of criticism for this. However, it did start making efforts by changing to a reusable packaging by 2025.

Opportunities 

Internet and Social Media: With the development of digital technology, consumers can be more connected to the company and the products that will be introduced in the company’s social media accounts. This will also provide an excellent and cost-effective opportunity for promotions as well as CRM management. 

Market Growth: Kit Kat has an opportunity to grow its market and revenues by expanding in emerging countries like Russia, China, or Brazil. Additionally, establishing companies in countries like China or India will provide the brand with cheap labor. 

Healthy Snacks: Since the world is moving towards a more health-conscious society, Kit Kat can introduce healthier options like low-calorie chocolate bars. 

Threats

Health Awareness: One threat that Kit Kat is facing is about increased health consciousness among people. Since Kit Kat has no healthy options to attract the health-conscious crowd, this remains an issue for the company.  

Competition: There is massive competition with established brands like Twix, Mars, and Snickers in the market. Additionally, new entrants to the market also cause a threat to the brand. To remain the absolute favorite candy snack and remain an established brand, Kit Kat has to keep up with the competition. 

Bargaining Power of Suppliers and Inflation:  Due to the rising costs of raw materials like dairy, packaging, and fuels, it is nearly impossible for Kit Kat to keep its low prices. Thus, price-conscious customers will want to switch to relatively low-priced competitors. 

Now let’s move on to the segmentation strategy of Kit Kat.

To understand the company’s target segment, I want you to check out this Kit Kat commercial if you haven’t done so already.

The commercial features people at work, having a bite of Kit Kat. Each one of them breaks a piece of chocolate-covered wafer and enjoys it while sitting around their working desks. We see them cutting a piece with a pleasant song-like sound and having a bite.

They all enjoy their Kit Kats as we see them change their facial expressions and make an “mmm” sound while eating. With Kit Kat, they fill their ordinary life with enjoyment as if it’s break time anytime. 

The enjoyment they express towards a simple break by having a Kit Kat leads to the only conclusion. The segment that Kit Kat chose to target are Sharers.

So, who are Sharers?

Lifestyle and Values: 

People who belong to the Sharer target segment enjoy every little moment of life. They are very adventurous, thus enjoy challenges and risks. Sharers take care of their families and expect recognition for their efforts.

They enjoy regular visits to shopping centers and are careful with the boundaries of their limited budget. Sharers like to escape the reality, so magazines and movies are their favorite tools that feed their dreams.

Sharers are very ambitious and work both for their career and money since money is the reward for their success. They love staying in at home and cooking for their family members. Sharers pay attention to what’s organic and environmentally friendly. They also love taking care of themselves, enjoy dressing up, and stay up to date with fashion trends.

Shopping Preferences: 

Sharers are brand oriented and purchase brands and quality products whenever it’s possible. They love exploring new brands and products, so they easily switch brands out of curiosity. Shopping provides them fulfillment in life. Sharers shop by their needs but like praising themselves from time to time. Moreover, they always look for special offers so that they can buy the item they want for a price they can pay.

Here are some interesting facts about the segment:

• They like gardening, painting, watching movies, reading books, and everything that includes spending time at home.

• When watching movies, they give preference to actions, thrillers, and romances. But when it comes to books, they love reading about health, cooking, and gardening. 

• They enjoy going out for fast food, bars, cafes, and discos but rarely attend theatres, operas, or other cultural events. 

• Sharers rarely go on holiday and therefore haven’t traveled much.

• The internet helps them escape the reality. However, they don’t feel very comfortable with the internet and see few advantages in its use. They use it to read lifestyle magazines and topics related to health, beauty, fashion, and celebrity life.

• Sharers think that being informed about what’s going on in the society, politics, and economy is not their priority, so they rarely follow the news.

• They love watching TV and prefer watching performances, opera and other cultural programs on it. What regards to the radio, sharers enjoy only mainstream channels.

16 Personalities (why do you need them in your business?)

After understanding the basics of Sharers behavior you may ask, what kind of brand will be interesting for them? Which hidden and at the same time important things have to be considered? You can find all the answers to these questions in our e-book called “16 Personalities”.  You will also find all the solutions for your marketing problems, which will obviously change your insights about buyer persona.

Of course this is one of the 16 personalities and with this book you will discover all of them. With knowledge of each 16 personalities you will confidently find your ideal buyer persona and change your marketing strategy to achieve new levels. The book also gives you some other hints for selling your product and negotiating with your clients.

To sum up, Kit Kat has been around for more than a century and is a powerful brand that deserves separate attention and discussion. I hope you were able to gain some insights into how Kit Kat succeeded and what marketing strategies it uses to keep its place in this dynamic industry. Check out the main page of our website for more posts like this.