You’ve seen them on posts across your preferred social media platforms. People have their favourites, and they really do make your otherwise dull texts a bit more visually appealing. Emojis are everywhere, and we’re adding to them every year. Most people use emojis for their personal social media communications, but what about using these cute little icons on business social media profiles? Let’s take a look at where you should and shouldn’t be using emojis, what customers think about business using emojis, and which emojis are most likely to get customers engaging with your posts:
Emoji Use Per Social Media Platform
Did you know that 92% of social media users utilise emojis in their posts? Most of our customers are using emojis, but what about companies? Here’s what we’ve noticed across our clients’ social media channels (one’s we don’t manage):
Emoji use is very high on Facebook, and customers seem to engage more with posts that feature emojis, but only if the emojis being used are congruent. In other words, the emojis being used must be relevant to the post copy and visual elements.
We recommend using between 4 and 8 emojis per post on Facebook.
Twitter
Emoji use on Twitter has always been high, but we’ve noticed a recession of excessive emoji use on this social platform. Emphasis is placed more on hashtag use, with bright emojis being used to draw attention to the post.
We recommend using between 3 and 7 emojis per post on Twitter.
Emojis are rarely used on LinkedIn, as far as we can see. This social platform is seen as being more formal, and posts with too many colourful emojis are seen as being ‘spammy’. If businesses use emojis on LinkedIn, they’re usually hand emojis (such as thumbs up, pointing finger, and hand shake).
We recommend using between 1 and 3 emojis per post on LinkedIn.
Here businesses utilise emojis and hashtags in a big way. Since Instagram is a visual platform, posts are filled with relevant emojis and make the post copy pop almost as much as the accompanying image.
We recommend using between 5 and 10 emojis per post on Instagram.
What Customers Think of Emojis
In 2016 mobile marketing company, Appboy, released a study that interviewed 500 social media users across the world and examined over six billion brand messages. This study looked at emoji usage rates, and how customers respond to emojis being used in marketing messages.
Emoji use in business brand messages increased by 609% between 2015 and 2016, which means that more and more companies are using emojis on social media. But what do their followers think of this?
Open rates for Android push notifications containing emoji increased 1,063% between 2015 and 2016.
This means that customers are more likely to open a social media notification containing an emoji or two than one’s that feature no emoji. So, what about male versus female target audience emoji reactions?
72% of women think that emoji use by brands is either fun, relatable or normal. The percentage of men who feel the same is 67%.
This means that women are marginally more open to emoji use on branded social media messages. When looking at how customers feel about emoji use, 64% say they love or like emojis, 29% say they’re neutral, and only 6% say they dislike or hate emoji use on social media.
Emojis Most Likely to Receive Engagement
When it comes to how customers react to emojis, the word to remember is novelty. Notice that none of the top 5 emojis listed below are face emojis. This is more than likely due to the fact that consumers use common emojis, like facial reactions throughout instant messages, pretty often. So, using less-popular emojis could be garnering more engagement because customers don’t see them as often. Here are the top 9 emojis most likely to increase social engagement:
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The Importance of Emoji A/B Testing
Here at WSI Durban, we take a scientific approach to prove theories for our clients. This involves, in the case of emoji use on social media, posting a few messages with emojis – and a few similar ones without – then comparing engagement rates. To figure out if you should use emoji on your business social media channels, consider testing and measuring. Don’t have time for this type of thing? Contact WSI today and we’ll craft a rock-solid business social media plan for you!