As a branding agency, strategy comes first when we create social media content for our restaurant clients. That includes the feed-filling memes that we all love to hate (or hate to love, depending!). Deciding whether or not to include memes in our content mix is one of the key steps in our initial strategy session, and continues as we test and adjust to respond to changing algorithms and trends.

As with everything social, our strategy starts with the brand: what are the brand’s values, personality and voice? Hand–in-hand with that, we look at our social media goals: growth, engagement, education, brand-building?  Serious brands, where we’re focused on sharing expertise may not be the right fit for memes. But for a more fun, and playful brand where we’re looking to drive engagement, memes can strengthen an account.

More than just social media gimmicks 

When deployed without a solid social media strategy, memes are just gimmicks. You can jump on the bandwagon, and you might get some eyes on the feed, or even seem “relevant”—but if the posts doesn’t resonate with your brand or audience, or you reach the wrong people, it doesn’t really matter how many people see the post.  

On the flip side, a meme that’s well chosen can strengthen a social account in several ways.

• Build community: a locally based meme, like our skyscraper graffiti post for HATCH, helps connect the restaurant to its neighborhood, while staying true to the brand’s sassy tone.
• In the moment: as an agency, we aren’t on the ground at the business every day. Our content is carefully crafted in advance, and while we work hard to give our feeds a sense of time and place, jumping quickly on a meme or news item roots an account in reality. Talking about the same thing as your followers, at the same time, helps build connections. (Hi Pink Friday – we saw you and got the engagement to prove it.)
• Make marketing funny: memes can be a great way to turn a marketing post into more. Wrapping HATCH’s parking message in a meme made it funnier, more relevant, and more likely to be seen.

Photoshopping “validated parking” graffiti onto a newsworthy Los Angeles skyscraper was a wild idea, but one that drove results.  Less than 24 hours after posting (at our algorithm derived optimal time), it has the highest engagement of any post on the account, and is in the top 5 for reach (so far).