How to Use Emoji in Social Media Marketing

We may not realize it while sending out those text messages; but we do use a lot of Emoji every now and then. By conveying emotions in a simple yet understandable way, Emojis minimize to a great extent, the misinterpretations that are associated with text messages.

Now that the Emojis have entered the world of marketing, they have started making the subject lines of product pitches a lot trendier than ever before. With Emojis being a great hit among the Millennials, many companies have started benefitting by using Emoji for marketing campaigns.

A couple of years ago, Chevrolet did an entire press release in emoji. Crazy as it was, their idea was to reach out to the millennial generation of their client base through the best way they preferred.

Although the act did establish Emoji as a probable means of communication in the marketing world, Chevrolethad to issue a decoder since not everyone (including the millennials) could understand the release.

It is easy to get carried away when you are trying to get creative. But you need to understand what works and what does not before adding it into your marketing efforts. Emojis is sure one of them.

But before you start doing your research on how to use emoji in Facebook or how to use Twitter Emojis, go through these following tips. They will tell you all that you need to know about the use of emoji in social media:

#1 Make them Understandable

92% internet users make use of Emojis in their day-to-day communication. So, a large portion of your target audience is into using Emojis. However, until you know how they prefer to use their Emojis, you cannot possibly start harnessing the power of these amazingly colorful symbols.

Conveying an entire sentence through Emojis may be a strict No-No as it takes a lot of efforts to understand. Hardly anyone has the time to decode and interpret what you are trying to convey.

If you want to put through your message you will have to do it in an easily understandable manner. So, instead of replacing words with emoji’s, use them as cues to help your audience understand how to interpret the words that came before them.

As far as possible put them at the end of your sentence or thought. And try not to stuff your posts with too many Emojis. Instead of coming across as friendly you may end up seeming way too sappy.

#2 Understand what they mean

Emojis come from the Japanese Culture. So if you are not from that part of the world, you may have trouble with your interpretation of Emojis. Before you start looking for answers on how to use Emoji in Instagram, make sure you take a look at Emojipedia and get to know the actual meanings of Emojis. You may also want to know how these Emojis display on various platforms of social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

More often than not there are differences between the real meanings of Emojis and our interpretation of them. Here are a few examples:

The Emoji of ‘Woman Tipping Hand’ might seem to you as a woman saying “Look how fabulous I am.” But in reality this is the symbol of an information desk person asking, “How may I help you?”

You may interpret the ‘Open hands’ Emoji as a ‘stop’ sign. But it is not so. It actually conveys openness — the symbol for a hug.

The “Person bowing deeply” Emoji is often interpreted as a guy whose brain is about to explode. But it is actually a sign of respect in the Japanese culture which is used to request a large favor or express a sincere apology.

Similarly, the swooping star Emoji is actually the symbol for dizziness.

And the woman you thought was saying “You’re blowing my mind,” is only saying “Yes.”

#3 Use your Emojis as per your Brand and Platform

Not all Emojis may go well with your brand and not all go well with all social media platforms. Make sure you do your homework on how to use Emoji in Facebook, how to use Emoji in Instagram, and how to use Twitter Emojis, before you actually start using them. Although Emojis are used across industries, there is a difference in the way they are interpreted.

For instance, the blowing kiss Emoji would seem improper in many industries. However, it may fit perfectly well in beauty, health or feminine industries.

#4 Use Less to Mean More

Many brands end up using too many Emojis in a single tweet. Although the strategy may work in certain cases, it may not actually be necessary.

One or two cleverly curated emojis are good enough to add some personality and life into your social media posts. You only need to make sure they are relevant. That said it is perfectly understandable to get carried away by the Emoji infatuation.

#5 Use them for real-time engagement

Emojis provide you a way of showing your customers, the human side of your brand.

The brands that use Emojis are often seen as Fun and relatable brands. However, one of the ways to use emoji in social media is to add them into your images.

You can create real-time marketing images using some fun Emojis for various campaigns. There is no limit to the possibilities here. It all depends on how creative you can get.

For example, Domino’s made it easy for its customers to order pizza via Emoji. All that you have to do to order your pizza is send a text message with a Pizza Emoji.

It is not about using them excessively; but you can definitely get creative.

You can use Emojis in your status updates on Facebook. However, it is always wiser to find out which ones will be most effective in conveying your message. So, analyze your context and then put a limit on the number of Emojis that you’re likely to use.

#6 Run Contest on Social Media

Contests are always great ways to engage with your audience.

Za came up with India’s first emoji based contest on Twitter and Instagram, in which users were asked to explain what #TrueBeauty means to them, just by using Emojis.

To make it easier for the participants Za came up with a few creative ways to initiate the contest.

Being a mobile-only contest, this campaign managed to increase audience interactions and acquire new followers for the brand.

Key Takeaway

A picture is worth a thousand words. Sure enough Emojis can help you convey all those things that you cannot convey through text. Apart from providing emotional cues, they also bring in an informal playfulness into your messages. However, you need to know how to use Emoji in social media, in order to make a powerful marketing tool of them.

It doesn’t matter whether you like them or not; Emojis are definitely here to stay!