What is a meme?
There are websites that can tell you all about the history of “memes.” I’ve read them–very interesting. Being wildly popular is intrinsic to true memedom, although in reality, you don’t know at the outset what will be wildly popular (unless you resort to low brow humor that is sure to appeal to the masses. Those are always popular. Sigh). At any rate, in common usage, memes are those eye-catching pictures with funny, clever, or inspiring words that you see people sharing every day on Facebook and other social media sites.
Why should I use memes to promote my blog?
See “wildly popular” above. 
On Facebook, when you post a meme to your blog’s page and people share it, the name/link to your blog’s page appears above the meme and generally under it as well. If you include your logo on the meme itself (and you should, for better brand recognition), that’s three opportunities for people to get to know your blog. The more people share it, the more your blog becomes a household name! This is a good reason to have a blog name that is memorable and that tells something about the nature of your business. For example, I am working now on creating memes for an online literary magazine and blog; the name of the blog mentions writing, thus possibly driving curious writers to our page. On a cautionary note, I’ve sometimes seen very funny memes that originally came from a page whose name is a string of vulgarities. If I notice that, I won’t share it. If I don’t notice and share it, well then I’m embarrassed and that makes me dislike the original page too. I don’t think they care; I’m pretty sure they’re going for shock value (see low brow humor above). Still, I think it is possible that a legitimate blog might have a name that would make people pause before associating themselves with it. Something to consider.
Memes have a great potential to be free publicity if they do become popular (You can spend money to create memes, but you don’t have to). Many people use meme generators to create memes and you can readily choose a meme that is “trending now.” Personally, I think those get old fast. However, it is helpful to touch on some kind of common cultural knowledge or at least a thought or feeling that many people will be able to relate to, though since you are trying to drive traffic to your blog, you are writing to a niche, too. In my next post, I will talk about creating an original meme from scratch.
Have you used memes to drive traffic to your blog? Has it been effective? Let us know all about it below.
The post What Are Memes And How Can I Use Them For Promotion appeared first on Thinking Outside The Sandbox.
