Spruce Up Your Marketing With These Awesome Sauce Emoji Tips ?

92% of the online population has used an emoji at least once, and if you’re a marketer, that means you need our emoji tips.

While some marketers may view the emoji as slang or unprofessional, brands using Appboy’s services and saw an increase of 777% when using emojis in branded campaigns.

If you’re on the fence, do me a favor and read this post all the way through.

We’ve got a boatload of examples of great emoji marketing and even more emoji tips. ?

First, Some ?-Popping Emoji Stats

Emoji may be a fun way to text your friends, but they may also have more meaning than you think (especially if you’re a marketer).

• Our brain interprets some emoji the same way it interprets words
• 56% of marketers who used emojis in their email subject lines had higher open rates
• The most popular emoji in 2016 was ? (“Face With Tears of Joy” — and one of my personal favorites) [Source]
• 4 out of 10 millennials would rather engage with pictures than read
• Nearly 50% of comments and captions on Instagram are composed of emoji
• You can manage your banking using emoji (⁉️ — totally cray)

Now that you’re wheels are turning, let’s dive into a few emoji tips that have worked well for marketers.

Emoji Tips: Email Marketing

There are many emoji tips for email marketing, but we’ll sum up the most important things to remember in an easy-to-read list:

1. Both Apple and Google to support emojis in email subject lines
2. Choose emoji that compliment your email subject and/or subject line
3. Don’t use emoji to replace words (instead, go with tip #2 and use them to enhance what you’re saying)
4. Using emoji isn’t spamming (as indicated in our stats, using them increases your open rate!)

Below is a starter-pack of ways you can use emoji in your subject lines:

Our sale is on fire! ?

? 20% OFF new merchandise! ?
Summer savings inside ?

Look cool ? at the pool this summer ?

Join us for happy hour! ?

? Reminder: Sales ends Sunday

These are the hottest vacations this year ✈️

? Give feedback, get gifts …

We LOVE these looks! ?

Your options are endless!

I will add one caveat here. And that’s if you’re a buttoned-up business, and emoji truly aren’t part of your vocabulary, don’t try using them to look cool.

Emoji Tips: Social Media Marketing

Almost every audience you’re aiming to reach through social media is a-okay with using emoji as a way to communicate.

That’s right, emoji aren’t just for millennials as the graphic below details.

[Source]

Ask yourself these questions before using emoji in your social — or other — marketing messages:

1. How will my audience feel about this emoji?
2. Which emoji enhance my marketing message or what I’m trying to convey?
3. Do I know what the emoji I’m using mean (be careful!)?
4. Am I using enough/too many?

Think of emoji as a way of improving your online communications since your audience can’t see or hear you “for real.” They can help you/your brand:

• Relay sentiment
• Provide clarity
• Communicate in fewer characters when space and attention spans demand a premium

But even though we’re eagerly touting emoji use, there are some things they just can’t replace, like:

• YOU. Or behind-the-scenes content. Emoji can put the exclamation point on humor or snark, but they’ll never take the place of you/your brand’s identity (for that try Bitmoji, which we’ll talk about later)
• Every emotion or words you’re trying to convey because emoji use varies by culture

With over 60% of social media made up of images, using emoji can certainly help you fit in AND stand out.

And creating custom emoji for your brand or business is clearly the wave of the future.

Emoji Tips: Where To Get ‘Em

Here are four sites we love for snagging emoji for marketing:

1. Getemoji.com — This site will show you little black boxes for emoji that don’t populate well with the system you’re using (good to know!)
2. Getemoji.com (classic) — Shows you emoji that are compatible with all browsers (it’s basically as it’s named … the classics).
3.  Philiapp.com — For an easy peasy copy and paste of emoji (and it keeps tabs on your most recently used for ease of use).
4. Bitmoji.com — For making your own personalized emoji. See mine below.

Are You Sold On Speaking Emoji?

With all of the emoji tips and statistic listed above, what is your gut telling you?

I’m curious: do you use emoji in your marketing? Why or why not? Let me know in the comments section below!

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Brooke B. Sellas

Brooke B. Sellas is the in-the-trenches Founder & CEO of @HelloBSquared, an award-winning social media, advertising, and social media customer care agency. She's also the author of Conversations That Connect -- a book all about social listening and social media customer care. Brooke's marketing mantra is “Think Conversation, Not Campaign” so be sure to give her a shout on the socials!

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