With the recent exception of Twitter, where a number of brands are experimenting with paid ads, digital giants like Meta and Google also remain off limits for weed marketers.

Partly because there are limited options and ongoing censorship, cannabis companies spend 79% less on marketing than other CPG players, when comparing ad spend as a percentage of revenue, per Surfside. 

At the same time, more than 85% of cannabis businesses say they struggle to reach their target consumer, according to New Frontier Data.

As noted in the report, states across the country continue to legalize medical and adult-use cannabis sales; the tally now stands at 37 states and Washington D.C., with more expected to join the green rush. There are an estimated 54 million American cannabis consumers in the regulated and illicit markets, worth $107.7 billion. 

Marketing that speaks to current and canna-curious consumers has long been considered an invaluable tool to help lure people from the unregulated market.

‘Invitation for creativity’

CMC now has some 200 members, including CannaCraft, DadGrass, Weedmaps, Kiva, Sundae School and Pure Beauty. While the rules outlined in Full Spectrum are voluntary, the group may help set a precedent for other emerging categories, according to Dorian Slater Thomas of the law firm Frankfurt Kurnit Klein & Selz‘s advertising and interactive entertainment division.

“Perhaps the CMC and its guidelines will inspire other plant-based industries, like psilocybin (psychedelic mushrooms), to consider similar self-regulatory measures,” Slater Thomas told Adweek.

The report’s release “signals that the industry has reached a certain level of sophistication,” Slater Thomas said, noting that the winners will be agencies and brands “who see such guidelines as an invitation for further creativity, not a prohibition to creativity.”