‘Asking for friend’: How can brands successfully use humor in social media exchanges?

By Mathieu Béal, Charlotte Lécuyer, and Ivan Guitart

Humor on social media can be a fantastic tactic for brands to engage their audience. It is now widespread for brands to use humor in their online interactions with customers. But brands also periodically respond humorously to other brands' content on social media. Some brands, like Wendy’s and Burger King, have become extremely popular for their repetitive use of humor against other brands. Mathieu Béal, Charlotte Lecuyer, and Ivan Guitart conducted research to better understand how people react to these humorous brand-to-brand dialogues.

Humor is generally associated with positive consequences, but it is also a double-edged sword that can turn into a “bad buzz” for brands if inappropriately used. Hence, what makes things funny? And what makes things not funny? We relied on the benign-violation theory, a recent theory of humor that explains humor always starts with a violation, meaning something that threatens one’s sense of how the world ought to be. In brand-to-brand dialogues, brands are expected to be formal and professional, so the use of humor represents an informal and familiar communication style, which represents a violation of communication norms. Then, the benign-violation theory explains that this violation would be funny if it is simultaneously judged as benign, meaning harmless and “okay.” Conversely, a malign violation (i.e., harmful) would not be perceived as funny. For instance, seeing your friend fall (i.e., violation) can only make you laugh if (assuming you are a nice person) they did not hurt themselves (i.e., benign). This research investigates when humorous brand-to-brand dialogues constitute a benign violation by considering three components: the humor type, the competitive context between the brands, and their positioning.

First, we compared two humor types: affiliative humor (e.g., a benevolent form of humor, including gently teasing, playfully poking, and practical jokes) and aggressive humor (e.g., a malevolent form of humor, including cruel teasing, sarcasm, and derision). They conducted an experiment and asked a series of questions to a panel of participants to understand their reactions to these two humor types. Their results show that participants exposed to affiliative humor were more amused compared to participants exposed to aggressive humor, resulting in higher brand attitudes and purchase intentions. Participants exposed to the aggressive form of humor inferred that the brand had some ulterior motives in using humor, which lowered their brand attitudes and purchase intentions.

Second, we checked whether the effectiveness of the two aforementioned types of humor depends on the competitive context between the two brands. A fast-food brand like Wendy’s does not hesitate to use humor against its fast-food competitors (e.g., McDonald’s or Burger King), but also against its non-competitors (e.g., the supermarket chain 7-Eleven). Again, the authors conducted another experiment and found that participants preferred affiliative humor, no matter whether the target of the joke was a competitor or not. However, aggressive humor was more effective when the brand targeted its competitors. Participants were more amused by aggressive humor in this context because the act of putting down its competitor with humor is perceived as “part of the competitive game,” making aggressive humor look more like a benign violation.

Finally, we investigated whether the humor type must be adapted to the brand’s positioning, either a top-dog brand (i.e., a leader in the market with a dominant position; e.g., Coca-Cola, Amazon) or an underdog brand (i.e., a brand with external disadvantages and a lack of resources). The conclusions derived from another experiment and the collection of actual posts on X—associated with their number of likes and shares—are that underdog brands should stick to affiliative humor. However, aggressive humor represents a very interesting strategy for top-dog brands. Top-dog brands receive more likes and retweets when using aggressive humor rather than affiliative humor. Results from the additional experiment also revealed that aggressive humor and affiliative humor perform equally in terms of purchase intentions. Overall, top-dog brands can safely use aggressive humor because it generates more engagement and, thus, more social media visibility without harming customers’ purchase intentions.

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Article details

Humor in Online Brand-to-Brand Dialogues: Unveiling the Difference Between Top Dog and Underdog Brands
Mathieu Béal, Charlotte Lécuyer, and Ivan Guitart
DOI: 10.1177/10949968241266828
First published: July 31, 2024
Journal of Interactive Marketing: Sage Journals

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