Remember the famous “One does not simply…” featuring Boromir from Lord of the Rings? 

From this example, you could guess that memes have been around for a long time, but people recently started talking about meme marketing. Many are still arguing if using memes in marketing is real or just a short-term fad.

Memes are, simply put, ideas that catch on. This book is, not so simply, a collection of memes in essay form …, written by self-proclaimed off-planet journalist Rheingold.

— Eloise L. Kinney, Booklist, 1 June 1988

The term “meme” itself was coined by biologist Richard Dawkins in 1976. Then in 1996, internet users started sharing short, fun clips among themselves. 

It got a boost when Facebook, Instagram, and other social media came into existence. A lot of social media groups and threads are dedicated solely to memes. Even further – some memes in the blockchain space became a base for cryptocurrencies.

What Is Meme Marketing And Why Should Crypto Companies Care?

The average user spends over two hours on social media daily. That adds up to 60 hours a month, 730 hours a year. 

It’s a lot of time.

Think about it. People scroll through their feed, “like” what they like, and block what they dislike. 

Where does brand promotion fall here? 

Well, is it something useful, educative, or fun to look at? If it is, it might get “liked”, shared, and do its work. 

If it isn’t? Chances are, people are going to scroll past and forget. Or try to block to avoid seeing ads from that brand again. 

This is not what startups hope to see when they launch campaigns.

So where does it all fit in the marketing? Using memes in marketing could make your messages way more memorable, shareable, and sometimes, viral.

Crypto Marketing Is Challenging – Meme Marketing Is A Solution

Crypto startups have little chance to survive without getting the word out. Although blockchain has made a big leap in recent years, the companies still have it tough.  

There is a number of things and pain points that are specific to the crypto niche, and they make marketing challenging to handle.

#1. Many crypto startups are seen as SCAM

Blockchain technology makes it hard to track crypto transactions. This is convenient for scamming. Many “startups”, especially among ICOs ( Initial Coin Offerings – fundraising campaigns looking to create a new crypto coin, app, or service), turn out to be scammers looking to trick the investors out of their money.

This, together with pain #2, make people suspicious of anything related to crypto. 

#2. The crypto market is unpredictable and changes within days

The cryptocurrency industry is volatile and constantly changes. Things can change within a day – as happened with Dogecoin after Elon Musk made a tweet. 

#3. Marketing in the niche is expensive

Crypto is a difficult industry to handle for an average marketer. You’d need to hire experts if you want results without wasting your budget. 

Experts are costly to hire, especially since there are not that many of them. 

This raises your marketing budget and makes the struggle startups face even more fierce. 

#4. Experts in crypto tend to prefer their projects

Another reason why experts in the crypto market are rare is that many of them prefer to develop their projects to earn bigger revenue.

This leaves startups no choice but to hire newbies. Their marketing budget is spent ineffectively while their hires struggle to catch up with the niche and trends.

Marketing through memes can help get around this since you don’t need high qualifications to start.

#5. SEO for the crypto industry is effective but difficult 

SEO can get you a great ROI, but you still need to hire a good SEO team for that. And just like with other professionals, there aren’t many who have the right expertise. 

SEO is also a long-term approach and requires weeks and months to show results. Meanwhile, a startup needs to get clients to keep the business running.

#6. Paid advertising platforms have restrictions for crypto themes

Google, Twitter, Facebook, and other platforms have restrictions on ads for cryptocurrency because of the abundance of scams. 

So while paid ads are the direct channel to consumers for other businesses, crypto companies have to use roundabout means or drop it altogether.

The bottom line is that you don’t have months to experiment and learn by failing since you might spend your entire budget with nothing to show. 

The crypto niche is incredibly dependent on and governed by the community. You need to have a solid reputation and a strong following, keep the community engaged, and capitalize on trends. 

That’s what meme marketing is capable of – providing an inexpensive alternative to high-cost and high-maintenance tactics. It can explain complex blockchain-related terms in simple words, help you evoke hype around the project, grab the audience’s attention, and engage users with minimum investments.

Crypto Startups That Got It Right: Pudgy Penguins, Dogecoin, Kucoin

The idea of businesses using memes has gained attention in recent years, and many have already tried it – and seen massive success – in various industries. The blockchain is a prime example of this – memes in the blockchain space can even serve as a source for new currency or rising coin prices.

Let’s take a look at meme marketing examples of brands that helped boost their recognition and engagement.

Pudgy Penguins 

Pudgy Penguins is a collection of 8,888 NFTs available on OpenSea, an NFT (non-fungible tokens) marketplace on Ethereum. 

The project was launched in July 2021. It became a phenomenon in the NFT space after penguins’ price went from less than $300 to over $6,000 apiece in just a few weeks.

Why did this happen? There were viral crypto memes and community.

Pudgy Penguins is a good example of how to use memes in marketing.

Blockchain is a relatively new phenomenon, and the power of memes and communities has a clear effect on it. Pudgy Penguins’ idea to launch a meme contest led to the twenty-times price jump, which greatly illustrates meme marketing’s power. 

Dogecoin

Dogecoin was created in 2013. It originally was a joke based on a famous meme featuring a Japanese breed of dog, Shiba Inu. The cryptocurrency is based on Litecoin and was marketed as a “fun” version of Bitcoin – with its price being low and accessible to everyone. 

In 2021, Dogecoin’s value “soared” by around 216 percent – and it happened after Tesla CEO Elon Musk tweeted about it. 

The new price of Dogecoin wasn’t anything to write home about – Bitcoin (BTC), Ripple (XRP), and some others are way more expensive. The point is elsewhere. Its growth, triggered by Elon Musk’s comment, made it one of the most talked-about cryptocurrencies available.

There are over a hundred other meme coins – cryptocurrencies that arose from famous internet memes. Together with “serious” crypto coins like Bitcoin, they serve as an endless source of crypto memes. 

Kucoin

Kucoin is a large cryptocurrency exchange offering the ability to buy, sell, and trade cryptocurrencies. Kucoin’s meme marketing examples are attuned to their followers, and they get to see the worthwhile return in engagement. 

4 Tips On Doing Meme Marketing For Crypto Projects Right

We have talked about many reasons to use memes, and now it’s time to do it in practice. You don’t need a marketing department for that, nor do you need a big budget. 

Here are four actionable tips on how to use memes in marketing.

#1. Keep in mind your brand’s vision

Is your brand’s voice friendly, or is it edgy? To stay consistent, marketing through memes must reflect your brand’s message and fundamental values. 

#2. Create memes according to your target audience

If the target audience can not understand or relate to the context, the meme will not work. 

#3. Make use of current trends and memes that are going viral right now

One of the best and easiest strategies is to make a variation of the currently trending memes, whether they are crypto memes or something else. 

For example, many companies started using memes for advertising when Squid Game went viral. 

#4. Avoid offensive and questionable memes

Companies using memes for advertising need to watch out for things that are offensive, discriminative or are perceived as such.

Some memes were great originally, but their meaning and usage changed throughout the years. Then some are perfectly fine for one brand’s audience but might come off as offensive for another’s. 

Consider avoiding offensive memes and the ones you are not sure about. It is better to err on the side of caution unless you are sure your brand can handle the backlash should it occur.

Conclusion

It is hard to find a person that doesn’t like fun content. Memes give brands a way to win their customer’s hearts, so how about trying them out? 

Not sure where to start? 

Consider giving ReVerb a call or sending a message. We can develop a creative crypto marketing strategy reinforced with memes to help you conquer the hearts of potential users and investors.