How to Do Meme Marketing, According to Memelord Jason Levin

When most individuals see memes pop up, they don’t assume a lot about them.

“Oh it’s only a silly meme web page,” you may say. “What’s there to consider? What’s the large deal?” However what if I advised you a few of these “silly meme pages” are making hundreds of thousands?

And what if I advised you it wasn’t simply meme pages, however a few of Silicon Valley’s hottest startups and the world’s most iconic luxurious manufacturers are utilizing memes to make hundreds of thousands, too? Would you begin fascinated about tips on how to use memes in your advertising too? After all you’ll!

Meme advertising leverages the facility of humor to get consideration on the web, however humor-based advertising isn’t a brand new factor. It’s been achieved for tons of of years since newspaper advertisements within the 1700s for magical hair development potions.

Meme advertising is simply the most recent internet-native model of it. And it’s been utilized by the most important manufacturers on the planet — from Duolingo to Porsche, Sony, and extra.

As Gen Z and Gen Alpha take maintain and turn out to be the subsequent class of founders, CEOs, and CMOs, I consider this pattern will solely proceed to develop.

Right here’s why it’s best to implement it in your advertising technique ASAP.

Memes are the best leverage advertising on earth.

Leverage is all about attaining greater outcomes with much less work.

Meme advertising isn’t some magical get-rich-quick scheme. It’s a lever to drag like anything. And I feel it’s one of many strongest on the market.

Give it some thought. Memes are:

1. Free to make
2. Quick to make
3. A simple solution to go viral

What might be larger leverage than that?

After I realized this, I grew to become obsessive about understanding the tips to meme advertising.

I interviewed each memelord, meme marketer, and meme web page operator I might discover: a memelord who offered a content material company for $1M+, a development hacker at a fintech startup price $100M+ whose principal development tactic has been advertisements on meme pages to develop it, and a startup founder who drove $3M+ in SaaS gross sales from viral memes and offered his firm for $100M+.

Then, I wrote all about it in my e book Memes Make Millions.

However I didn’t simply write concerning the techniques.

I put the techniques into motion to show they labored. I tweet memes like a madman and get hundreds of thousands of views each month.

I went viral and received 26M+ views for a video of me studying meme-y books on the New York Subway. I even went viral in Paris and received changed into a meme!

All this consideration has resulted in tons of of 1000’s of {dollars} per yr as a advertising advisor serving to startups go viral (and blow up the web).

So, how does meme advertising work?

Step 1. Study the trade and tendencies.

In the event you tried paying me $100k to make memes about hockey, I couldn’t do it.

I do know nothing about hockey (besides that Canadians are weirdly good at it for some cause). However I could make memes about startups and enterprise capital all day.

I stay and breathe startups. I hearken to All-In and My First Million. I’m going to the tech events. I learn the books. I work with startups all day on a regular basis, and plenty of of my mates are founders/VCs.

I’m on the timeline interacting with individuals on this world all day. I’m deep on this world. And I could make viral memes night time and day.

The takeaway: You possibly can solely make memes about industries you’re deep in.

You may make memes about any trade from hockey to gardening to healthcare to startups. The primary factor is you must know the zeitgeist and what’s occurring.

As a result of the meme world is so fast-paced, I really began a daily newsletter with new viral memes to assist individuals work out the meme zeitgeist.

Step 2. Know the issues.

Good memes come from issues your trade faces.

In the event you take a look at the most effective meme pages throughout finance, tech, no matter, the most effective memes are sometimes about issues you’re dealing with.

In the event you’re in accounting, you meme about Excel. In the event you’re in startups, you meme about VCs taking the summers off to social gathering in France.

In the event you’re making memes in your model, turn out to be hyper-focused on what issues your customers face. In the event you’re engaged on software program for writers, you higher know what issues writers face (e.g., author’s block, not sufficient caffeine, and many others.).

Step 3. Know who you can not offend.

That is one thing tremendous underrated that almost all social media managers don’t take into consideration.

It’s really okay to offend some individuals. I don’t imply utilizing offensive language like insults or charged phrases — that’s by no means okay.

However it’s okay to poke enjoyable at a job group like accountants or YouTubers. You simply should be considerate and selective about who you’re offending and who you don’t need to ever offend or poke enjoyable at.

For instance, at one startup I work with, the product is all about serving to founders, so we by no means attempt to offend founders. As a substitute, we choose on VCs (they’re simple targets).

At one other startup, the shopper was engineers, so we by no means tried to choose on engineers. As a substitute, we picked on product managers (once more, one other simple goal).

Step 4. Embrace the cringe.

Is earning profits cringe?

I don’t assume so.

In spite of everything, I’ve proved that memes make hundreds of thousands.

Memes are a strong advertising tactic utilized by everybody from solo creators to public firms like Netflix. Cease worrying about being cringe, and concentrate on being humorous and earning profits.

Cringe is the new cool. Turn into a cringe arbitrageur. If you’re prepared to be cringe and do issues others are afraid of, you may get a lot extra consideration on the web.

Step 5. Grasp the instruments.

The instruments and software program are literally the least essential half.

Velocity is an important factor.

Sure, you should use paid software program like Photoshop, however you may simply as simply use free software program like Imgflip or Canva. Actually simply use no matter is the quickest.

My recommendation? Don’t overthink the instruments.

This isn’t a graphic design job — that is meme advertising. Don’t fear about excessive constancy, simply concentrate on being humorous. As a result of bear in mind, within the consideration financial system, being humorous makes hundreds of thousands.

The Takeaway

“Humor is said to power. To have a humorousness is to be sturdy: to maintain one‘s humorousness is to shrug off misfortunes, and to lose one’s humorousness is to be wounded by them. And so the mark — or at the least the prerogative — of power is to not take oneself too significantly.

The assured will usually, like swallows, appear to be making enjoyable of the entire course of barely, as Hitchcock does in his movies or Bruegel in his work — or Shakespeare, for that matter.” – Paul Graham, Taste

Or as I wrote in my e book, “By no means underestimate the jester as a result of he could also be a king in disguise.”

From the 22-year-old NYC goofball posting finance bro memes to the venture-backed startups making memes about Silicon Valley to public firms leveraging meme advertising — they’re all proof that fooling around on the web can assist you make critical cash.