After discussing memes in class and looking back to the discussion board post for a quick laugh, I realized how effective memes actually are. Richard Dawkins first coined the phrase in the 1970s, describing a meme as a“unit of cultural transmission”. Basically, this is when you read the meme and think; "Yes! I know exactly how you feel." Memes are highly relatable, thus being highly efficient, but for what? Memes can be anything from funny pictures of animals to satire that people commonly parallel in their lives, but I was curios what the outcome would be if memes were used for a reason other than entertainment.
After a bit more research I began to see that advertisers try to use memes for their products all the time. The old spice man, or the man your man could smell like, is a perfect example of a meme in marketing. The videos that old spice was producing turned viral and quickly became internet memes while simultaneously destroying old stereotypes of smelling like your dad. When a brand markets a meme correctly, they seem to expand enormously to new customer bases. The only problems are that; 1) When a brand doesn't get the meme right, people (myself included), don't want to be associated with that brand, and 2) Memes are unpredictable and rapidly changing. Old spice has already moved on to a new "Smellf" campaign, and are teetering on the brink of ridicule. So choose wisely if you want to market with memes, sometimes the choice isn't even up to you, but the internets freethinking minds. Have a great friday and holliday break!
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