If Every Brand Is Funny Online, Is Anything Funny?
Summary
Here’s Dominos, the pizza chain, posting on X last month: “red flag: not dipping ur slice in ranch.” And here’s Applebees: “‘Don’t eat after 8pm’ ok then tell me why apps are half off after 9pm??? Online influencers on TikTok have more sway over Gen Z than traditional advertising, said Donna Hoffman, a marketing professor at George Washington University. “So a lot of it was taking calculated risks and really experimenting on a channel that high-profile decision makers weren’t really paying attention to yet.” Wendy’s declined to mock us for this story. “When a brand can allow you, the audience, to play it, make it your own, that’s when you see things really transcend,” said Ariel Rubin, a 38-year-old former communications director for the Iowa-based Kum & Go, a convenience store known for cheeky social media posts. In 2021, Burger King in Britain posted on Twitter, “Women belong in the kitchen.” The negative reaction was loud and swift, despite efforts at damage control in the follow-up tweets: “If they want to, of course.