MEMES - ANY GOOD FOR YOUR MARKETING?

Today, I pick up on a question that was raised by my dear Indian friends from Jigsaw. It is about whether you should use memes in your corporate communication on social media or not.

What are memes?

Attributed to evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins in his 1976 bestseller The Selfish Gene, “a meme” originally described an idea, behaviour or style that spreads within a culture from person to person for the purpose of the meme’s own survival. In marketing, one can also describe a meme as an idea, behavior, or style that spreads by means of imitation from person to person within a culture and often carries symbolic meaning representing a particular phenomenon or theme. On social media, memes usually take the form of a GIF or static picture playing on a familiar theme, meaning, or phenomenon, often with text layered on top of or over the image.

Who is attracted by memes?

Psychology Today calls the iGeneration (aka Generation Z) the most technologically immersed generation. These are the ones that are practically online all the time according to Nielsen studies. They learn visually and memes are functioning like an instant gratification. Of course, it doesn’t exclude the fact that older generations also enjoy some good memes.

The Decade of Memes

Memes are all over social media. The ever-increasing number makes it impossible to keep track on how many are out there. The BBC once published an article headlined The Decade Of Memes. It is accessible for everyone as everyone can create them. There is no limit but the sky. The viral effect helps spreading them especially, when they hit the zeitgeist. No wonder, why marketeers saw the opportunity to use memes as a way to spread the word. 

The Dos and Don’ts 

Like with any tool in marketing, they're a couple pitfalls you want to avoid but also factors that will boost your effort. So, let′s have a comprehensive look at the dos and don′ts of meme marketing.

Do…

• Stay authentic to your brand
• Credit the source
• Keep your goals in mind
• Create your own fun campaigns
• Enable users to share it (user generated content)

Don’t…

• Try too hard
• Post dead memes
• Make it blunt advertising
• Use memes that you don’t understand
• Publish before testing 

There could be said more about memes, which started as a phenomenon, but with its growing popularity is not going to leave us (anymore). 

Please share your experience and opinion in the comment section.

Memes are welcome and easy to do at ImageFlip, where I have created mine.

Disclaimer: of course, copyrights need to be respected, when using content generated by third parties. Just because it looks fun, it doesn't mean it is free of copyrights. So check your sources for copyrights.