The Power of an Emoji
By Melissa Breer, TVG Account Executive
The wait is over… the taco emoji is here.
For what feels like a lifetime, people have been begging for a taco emoji. It’s been a trending topic, petitions have been signed, and people desperately took to social media to plead for the Unicode Consortium to develop a taco emoji. (Because how can you appropriately celebrate “Taco Tuesday” or Cinco de Mayo without it?)
Well, our prayers have been answered, history has been made, and dreams are coming true. With the release of the new iOS 9.1 update, iPhone users now have access to 150 new emojis, including the beloved and long-awaited taco… and people are seriously losing their minds!
Even major media outlets like Good Morning America, TIME, The Huffington Post and New York Magazine are talking about the #tacoemoji.
It’s fascinating to see the response and attention that one little image is generating. It proves how our daily lives have become completely immersed in technology and digital communication.
Brands are jumping on the bandwagon too, using emojis as part of their marketing and branding efforts. If you’ve been on Twitter at all in the past year, you’ve probably seen some of their new emoji additions that accompany certain hashtags, which are appropriately named “hashflags.” For instance, after SCOTUS legalized gay marriage, a rainbow heart emoji was added to #lovewins. When the new Star Wars movie was announced, Twitter created several character emojis, including C3PO and Stormtroopers. But, the most groundbreaking of all was when Coca-Cola became the first official brand to get its own emoji. If you tweet #shareacoke, Twitter adds an emoji of two tiny Coke bottles.
Now, thanks to the persistence of millions of people, we have the taco emoji. It shows just how powerful social media is, and how it can be leveraged to make change happen.
And, aside from being used to express how excited you are for your Mexican fiesta happy hour tonight, there are no doubt going to be tons of brands capitalizing on the new taco emoji—I’m looking at you Taco Bell.
