ROLE OF MEMES AND EMOJIS IN ENHANCING CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT

Abstract

The prevalent trend of using memes and emojis on social media has changed the landscape of communication across online platforms. Individuals use memes and emojis to communicate with each other on social media. This thesis is written to explore how memes and emojis would be perceived by the audience if they were employed in brand’s online communications. Qualitative netnography approach was used to evaluate the frequency of emojis in online brand communications. Almost 2800 social media posts and brands’ comments were examined, after which the brands using emojis more frequently were categorized. The results identified that thumbs-up (�), heart (�) and smile (�) were the most frequently used emojis by brand categories such as fashion brands, transportation industry, food industry and online startups such as Daraz, Foodpanda and the like. In addition to this, netnographic approach was also used to explore different social media platforms to identify instances of brands using memes and emojis in their communications. The aim of this was to examine customer engagement (in forms of reactions, comments and shares) on brands’ memes and emojis posts. 20 in depth, semi- structured interviews were then conducted to validate the results of netnography. The aim of the interviews was to investigate how respondents perceive and react to emojis in online brand messages. This study provides insightful implications for managers as using such tactics in online marketing communications can help build brand personality. Managers can also foster online customer engagement through the use of memes and emojis. Keywords: Meme Marketing, Emoji Marketing, Netnography, Customer Engagement