New generations will communicate with images instead of writing

If one thing could be singled out as the defining aspect of 2015, there is no doubt it would be emojis. These pictorial icons, which most often symbolize or express an emotion or action, began to be used en masse with the advent of smartphones, and this year the word ’emoji’ not only officially entered the Oxford Dictionary but was also declared the word of the year.

To the dismay of traditionalists, at one Welsh university, expression through these charming symbols has been declared the fastest-growing language in the world. As reported by the Independent, their power is evidenced by the fact that the esteemed New York Times used one emoji in the headline of an article, and The New Yorker even featured it on the cover. The Russian government even plans to ban the use of emojis depicting same-sex couples, while U.S. President Obama, logically, is a big fan of such pictorial expression. Given that consumers, especially millennials, have embraced emojis so well, marketers have increasingly incorporated them into their communications over the past twelve months. Some have even based entire marketing campaigns on them.

Consumers love them. The magazine AdAge has therefore highlighted ten campaigns in its latest issue that uniquely and innovatively used pictorial language to connect with consumers and, of course, increase sales of their products and services. Domino’s Pizza was among the first to recognize the opportunities that emoji communication offers. As early as late last year, it devised a delivery model using the popular ’emoji’ depicting a slice of pizza. It offered customers two easy delivery methods: by typing the phrase ‘easy order’ into the body of an SMS message (or ‘tweet’) or by using the aforementioned emoji. It turned out that people used the pizza slice emoji four times more often than they sent text messages, and during the observed period (from the launch of the emoji campaign), the total number of orders also increased. Coca-Cola also tested the possibilities of advertising with emojis, but unlike Domino’s Pizza, it used a branded emoji. In a campaign launched with the hashtag #ShareaCoke, Twitter users could share a bottle (Coca-Cola emoji) with their followers. From Coca-Cola’s Public Relations Department came the information that in just the first day of the campaign’s launch, 170.5 thousand bottles, or ’emojis’, were shared (of course, virtually).
After news broke that Apple and Android users would receive a range of new emojis on their smartphones, Taco Bell launched a virtual petition to include their product, taco, in the offering. Almost 33 thousand users signed it, and in June, the Unicode Consortium blessed the introduction of emojis for tacos, as well as other guilty pleasures like burritos and hot dogs (the latter was celebrated by the brand Chicago’s Superdawg). Taco Bell celebrated this with a campaign using the hashtag #TacoEmojiEngine, during which hundreds of sounds and images were presented in honor of that popular Mexican dish.

A flood of emojis. Unlike Taco Bell, which launched a petition, the American beer brand Bud Light only tweeted about emojis, but that was enough to spark a flood of comments on social media. Bud Light marked Independence Day on Twitter by posting a photo of the American flag made up of emoji flags, fireworks, and, of course, beer mugs. This very simple idea, or image, was shared by 146 thousand users during the American holiday. Burger King surprised its fans by announcing that its beloved Chicken Fries would become part of the permanent menu, and it celebrated this by launching a branded line of emojis. During the campaign, users could download a series of funny emojis depicting smiling chickens in various poses.
Not only food and fast-food brands have tapped into the popularity of emojis. The automotive brand Chevrolet announced in June this year the launch of the Chevy Cruz line with the help of comedian Norm Macdonald, whom it hired for a video campaign published on Twitter. The excitement surrounding the launch in the video was, of course, accompanied by emojis. They also followed the new release of the super-popular ‘Star Wars’, or the latest film installment of the popular science fiction series. Disney and Lucasfilm, in collaboration with Twitter, developed hashtag-generating emojis. Users who used the hashtags #C3PO, #Stormtrooper, or #BB8 in their tweets would see specially designed emojis featuring those characters. Another automotive brand, Ford Focus, focused its campaign on images. To advertise its cars, it launched a collection of digital images with captions like ‘Let’s Go!’ or ‘Drive Safe!’.

Say it with an image. During the ten-day campaign in September, users downloaded about 25 thousand images created by the automotive company in collaboration with Swyft Media each day. These downloads were shared about 40 thousand times daily on social media, resulting in a million so-called impressions. An interesting campaign was also the one by NBC celebrating the fortieth anniversary of the popular ‘Saturday Night Live’. In the app of the same name, they offered the possibility to download emojis of characters from the cult show ‘The Coneheads’, Debbie Downer and Matt Foley.
Given how users today embrace emojis, there is no doubt that they have a bright future ahead. A new package of these images is already being announced, which will be available for download on smartphones in 2016; it will include images like pregnant women, champagne, or bacon. People are clearly inclined to simplify things and do not care that language and classical written communication are suffering as a result. It is evident that we must come to terms with the fact that new generations will communicate with images instead of writing. What a shame.