Add a Touch of Humour to Your Content!

When we published our article 7 Types of Posts Likely to Generate Responses, we mentioned that humour is a great communication tool on social networks. Humour has the power to provoke positive emotion and lighten the subject. However, make sure to be careful how you use it.

This article looks at how Alexandre Cyr, Content Creator at Mechanic Web Services, goes about creating successful humorous material.

Mechanic Web Services and Humour

Throughout the year, Mechanic Web Services customers view fun posts on their respective Facebook and Instagram accounts. Quiz-type posts and posts with holiday themes, such as Halloween and Valentine’s Day, are good opportunities to use humour.

Here are some posted examples that our Content Creator designed, Alexandre Cyr, over the past year:

 Westlynn Auto Service

NAPA Auto Parts - Charlottetown

Create Direct Contact With Your Customers Using Humour

Leading researchers have demonstrated the benefits of humour and laughter on psychological and physical health, but what about their effect on business relationships? Well, humour facilitates being attracted to a marketing strategy by breaking down protective barriers and making content lighter. It generates direct contact with your customers and prospects.

“Don’t hesitate to use humour to promote a useful product, like a snow brush, or a basic service such as regular vehicle maintenance or scheduling an appointment for installing winter tires. You will create a surprise effect in content that might have become routine in your publication schedule. In addition, humour is often the basis for viral content,” explains Alexandre Cyr, Content Creator at Mechanic Web Services.

Humour in All Situations?

We want to tell you that creating humorous content is easy, but that isn’t totally true. Humour can be serious business! Here is a brief list of things to consider when creating this type of content:

• Target audience (age, gender, generation, etc.)
• The goal of the message you are conveying (sell a product or service, an idea, etc.)
• The emotion you are trying to provoke (joy, laughter, amazement, etc.)
• The accompanying image in the post that supports the message

For your audience to understand and appreciate your humour, it is important to distinguish between what is appropriate and what is not. Among the forms to avoid: belittling humour (targeting an individual or a group by focusing on their characteristics such as their intelligence, gender or appearance) and offensive humour (taboo topics such as sex and religion, vulgarities, etc.).

Remember, when in doubt, it is better to abstain than to apologize to your audience later. Before publishing humorous content, do not hesitate to test your joke or funny image on people around you. The more your content will be validated by people outside your auto centre or auto parts store, the more likely it will achieve its objective: make people laugh.