PSA: If Chuck E. Cheese or any of his fellow masked cohorts made you cry every time you saw him (or still does) feel free to skip the intro and go straight to the list. There are only electronic mascots down there, we promise.
Black Sheep has always been a big fan of mascots. Maybe sometime in our distant past, we stood with florescent pink fanny packs strapped on tight, waiting to get autographs of our favorite masked characters. Maybe we actually thought we were meeting the real Mickey and not some college student in a costume. Look, it doesn’t matter. The point is mascots are awesome. And all those masked figures roaming amusement parks enhance the magic, personality, and reality of our favorite vacation spots.
Twitter mascots can also generate brand magic (or we can go with the more savvy word, “buzz”), pump up your company’s personality and add a real-life touch to your business. They can become that bold voice, that bumbling character or that lovable know-it-all who clients will feel comfortable and excited to interact with. Or in other words, they allow you to speak from a new, less corporate perspective. And if done with the right level of pizazz a Twitter mascot will invite more traffic to your site. That, my friends, is the power of the mask. Ok. Enough talk. Let’s get to the examples. We’ve broken down the good and the bad habits of some Twitter mascots who represent their brands with zest, and one who could use some work. Why? Because we’re here to help. Enjoy and learn.
Aflac: Aflac Duck @aflacduck Followers: more than 7, 400
Who needs Daffy when you have the Aflac Duck? He tweets quirky thoughts all day, but even though he increased Aflac’s brand recognition through his commercials, his Twitter does not add much value to the campaign (other than a good chuckle now and then). He fails to interact with anyone, share interesting information, or give followers a reason to visit Aflac’s website. Instead, he mostly tweets nonsense. He is not living up to his spokes-duck potential.
The Breakdown:
The Good: His pithy and hilarious tweets make an insurance company seem cool!
The Bad: His mascot value suffers from no customer interaction, no real character development or back-story, no parallels with his commercial persona and no Facebook profile (wow, was that too harsh?). Aflac duck, go visit @RoamingGnome from Travelocity. He’s a great example of how to transition a TV personality to Twitter successfully.
Knorr/Lipton: Salty, @SaltysLife Followers: more than 1, 200
Knorr & Lipton have teamed up to reduce the sodium in their foods, and poor little Salty is their spoke-shaker. He’s cute, sad and newly unemployed. On Twitter, Salty does a good job maintaining a conversational and innocent persona. He uses his persona to lead his followers to his Facebook page where they can enter contests and buy cute Salty Merchandise. Knorr/Lipton have also made Salty a star – in several high-quality YouTube videos that is. Salty’s presence creatively spreads the word on Knorr’s new low sodium push in all the right places and ways.
The Breakdown:
The Good: He has the whole package, high quality and silly YouTube videos, a detailed Facebook profile, and (very tempting) Salty Merchandise. He has become a 3-dimensional character who represents the positive shift his company is making.
The Bad: Salty could have a stronger backstory. His connection to the campaign is not immediately obvious.
Compare the Market: Aleksandr Orlov @Aleksandr_Orlov Followers: more than 42, 300
Aleksandr Orlov’s character is so complete he has his own company, “Compare the Meerkat.” Along with that, he has a cute Meerkat face, a charming Russian accent and an autobiography that you can actually buy on Amazon. He also engages with his followers regularly while phonetically maintaining his accent. Love it.
The Breakdown:
The Good: Compare the Market is completely devoted to the spokesperson idea. Aleksandr is probably as far as you could ever want to go.
The Bad: Aleksander’s lacks of direct connection with the company. This may actually be a plus in some ways, but when investigating Aleksandr’s origins, it is easy to spend more time on his sites than on the actual “Compare the Market” site. However, his clever campaign makes it tough to forget Compare the Market’s creativity and personality.
Take a look at these Twitter mascots and think about what a lively Twitter spokes-creature could do for your company. Just remember it takes time, creativity, and quality information to really give your mascot a life of its own.