Humour is a vastly highly effective foreign money on social media within the UK and the nation’s smartest manufacturers comprehend it. They aren’t simply chasing the following viral gag. They’re weaving humour into the very cloth of their advertising methods.
This strategy isn’t about posting a cheeky meme and hoping it sticks. It’s about understanding the nuances of the British sense of humour—dry wit, self-deprecation and intelligent wordplay—and utilizing it with intent. Finished proper, it’s a instrument that builds loyalty, strengthens relatability and boosts model fairness with out crossing the road.
The ability of British humour on social media
If there’s one factor the UK is understood for, it’s the distinctive nationwide sense of humour. It’s dry, self-deprecating and, for those who haven’t grown up with it, it’s unattainable to mimic. It isn’t a surface-level choice. One research even discovered that the British’ choice for biting satire is genetically encoded.
Like a secret handshake, utilizing humour indicators that you simply’re a part of the membership. That you just get it. For manufacturers, it’s greater than only a tone alternative. Utilizing usually British humour successfully comes with measurable model outcomes like loyalty, advocacy and relatability.
Why humour resonates with UK audiences
While you consider the British sense of humour, most individuals consider phrases like:
- dry
- witty
- absurdist
- self-deprecating
- understatement
- sarcasm
Assume David Mitchell, Richard Ayoade or Phoebe Waller-Bridge: intelligent and dry however with a self-deprecation that undercuts any whiff of pretentiousness.
It’s a combination of traditional understatement, an anti-earnestness and a way that issues are funnier when acknowledged not directly.
This model of humour is a cultural staple. You will discover it on traditional sitcoms, panel TV reveals and in pub banter. When manufacturers use it successfully, it’s instantly recognisable and interprets to engagement, memorability and finally, model affinity.
Humour isn’t only for laughs—it builds model affinity
Humour is a strong driver for human connection. A shared snicker brings us collectively.
In keeping with Sprout Social’s Index, UK audiences prize relatability as one of the essential issues they count on from social media content material. It additionally reveals that 95% of UK social media customers count on manufacturers to know and faucet into tradition. In different phrases, tradition is how folks relate to manufacturers. Since humour is an enormous a part of British tradition, it follows that partaking in traditional British humour is a good way to be relatable.
Relatability builds belief and long-term model loyalty. That’s exactly what you should drive actual enterprise outcomes on social media.
Humour drives long-term loyalty and share of voice
One of many prime causes folks comply with creators on social media is straightforward: They make them snicker. Manufacturers can do the identical. Manufacturers that need to construct a loyal social media following can achieve this by merely tickling their viewers’s humorous bone. Humour has endurance. A single intelligent submit can resurface in somebody’s thoughts weeks later, holding your model prime of thoughts and constructing cultural foreign money.
Humour drives 43% of social media shares, giving humorous content material the next probability of producing natural attain and earned media. Pairing it with Social Listening lets groups observe buzz and sentiment shifts and spot when a joke turns into a long-lasting model second.
Use humour as a part of your content material technique, not a one-off
It’s not sufficient to be humorous sometimes,you should embed humour into your long-term content material technique to be efficient. Meaning focusing in your publishing workflows, analytics and what rivals are doing. In different phrases, it’s time to begin taking humour severely.
When humour is a part of a broader model voice system, it turns into scalable, measurable and repeatable.
1. Construct sequence, not stunts
A single social media meme is likely to be good for a chuckle, nevertheless it gained’t be sufficient to develop your viewers. Take into account making a content material format you can serialise.
If a consumer comes throughout a humorous Reel and sees that it’s labeled “Half 1”, they’ll have a purpose to hit comply with (extra on this later). Collection additionally ease the stress of continually inventing new concepts. When a format turns into a fan favorite, your viewers will usually inform you precisely what they need to see subsequent.
2. Observe what works and what doesn’t
Stand-up comedians speak concerning the significance of “studying the room”: figuring out which jokes to lean into and which to shrink back from based mostly on crowd response. This tactic is one which it is best to undertake, too. Studying the room digitally may be difficult with out highly effective social media reporting instruments.
Concentrate on KPIs like sentiment, shares and engagement fee to measure how your humour resonates. Use Sprout’s tagging and marketing campaign monitoring options to section and analyse your humour-driven posts particularly. Then iterate—refine your strategy based mostly on what your viewers really responds to, not what you guess they may.
3. Operationalise your humour technique with workflows and insights
Nice humour on social media could look spontaneous, however the perfect outcomes come from a structured strategy. By operationalising your humour technique, you make it scalable, repeatable and simpler to refine over time.
Sprout’s workflows make it simple to assessment every submit for tone and model alignment earlier than it goes dwell. Social Listening helps floor trending conversations so you possibly can take part on the good second, whereas Competitor Studies reveal how your content material compares throughout the business on key metrics.
With the correct instruments in place, you scale back danger, spot alternatives quicker and provides your staff the inventive freedom to ship constantly good content material.
Easy methods to keep sensible so humour doesn’t backfire
As highly effective as humour may be, it could actually additionally go mistaken. You should preserve the next ideas in thoughts for efficient danger administration.
Know the place your viewers attracts the road
This consideration actually comes right down to figuring out your target market. It’s protected to say, keep away from politics, faith and the tradition battle until you recognize precisely the place your viewers stands. If there’s an opportunity {that a} joke will cut up your viewers, don’t submit it.
Bear in mind: You’re a marketer first, comic second
Use analytics instruments to uncover your buyer demographics. This functionality will provide you with a greater gauge of what you possibly can and might’t joke about. Mixed with Listening instruments, it is going to make it easier to analyse sentiment for the way clients react to previous posts.
Backed by knowledge, you possibly can then set tone guardrails and make clear what you’ll and gained’t joke about.
Take a look at and approve tone with intention
Earlier than a submit goes dwell, run it by means of your tone information to examine that it aligns together with your model’s voice and values. Usher in various staff views—what’s innocent enjoyable to at least one particular person could learn as insensitive to a different. Sprout’s approval workflows allow you to construct a structured assessment course of, guaranteeing that your staff completely checks content material earlier than posting.
Pair that with a easy QA guidelines so your humour feels intentional, on-brand and audience-first each time.
Use Listening to watch sentiment in actual time
Simply as a humorist is attuned to and adjusts their act based on viewers reactions, Sprout’s Listening instrument empowers you to do the identical.
You may observe sentiment, trending key phrases and dialog quantity throughout platforms. If a joke sparks sudden negativity, you possibly can pivot shortly, alter messaging or be a part of the dialog to make clear intent. Pair Listening with the Sensible Inbox to see direct viewers suggestions because it occurs, and also you’ll flip potential missteps into alternatives to indicate responsiveness and shield model belief.
Take some time look easy
The most effective form of humour feels easy, however that doesn’t imply it occurs accidentally.
Take Rowan Atkinson, for instance. Famously, his comedic performances, from Blackadder to Mr. Bean, have been painstakingly deliberate and choreographed. He by no means improvised, however he had his act so off-pat that it seemed to be off the cuff.
Taking this quantity of care is precisely how it is best to strategy humour in your advertising efforts.
Behind the scenes, you’ll be utilizing sensible instruments to fine-tune your comedic content material, in addition to to check concepts, refine timing and be taught what resonates together with your viewers. Out entrance, it ought to really feel like traditional British wit: sharp, pure, and by no means try-hard.
How prime UK manufacturers use humour to attach
These examples spotlight how UK manufacturers are placing humour to work on social media.
Aldi UK
Aldi has clearly executed its homework on British humour.
Supply: Instagram
Aldi UK ran a two-part Instagram sequence that includes a speaking carrot giving directions to a buyer by means of an earpiece. Duties included bowling a watermelon down the aisle and shaking up fizzy drinks, and Instagrammers went wild for it.
The absurdity of a carrot giving a buyer directions feels prefer it’s taken recent out of a Monty Python skit. The skit itself, even the music, appears like an episode of Taskmaster.
Each of those acquainted British comedy staples have deep resonances for UK audiences, and it reveals. Simply take a look at the remark part!
THIS™
THIS is a meat different model that leans into absurdist, Monty Python-esque humour. The Insta Reel under contains a man with a wearable BBQ providing strangers within the gymnasium THIS merchandise.
Supply: Instagram
Let’s break down what’s taking place right here. A wearable BBQ is inherently absurd. Leaning right into a caricature of stereotypical masculinity (the person behind the grill) and contrasting it in opposition to social perceptions of meat options. The “macho” gymnasium setting pushes the distinction additional, subtly skewering social norms round masculinity, vegetarianism and the way plant-based options are perceived.
It provides as much as sharp satire: absurd, self-aware and unmistakably British.
In case your model is about difficult social norms, think about what these norms are and create sharp satirical content material of your personal.
Currys
Based in 1884, Currys nonetheless has clients mistaking the model for a meals enterprise. Quite than rebranding fully, the electronics retailer leans into the joke in its Instagram bio.
Supply: Instagram
The model continues that humour all through its social posts with a unusual, irreverent and quintessentially British tone.
Supply: Instagram
This Reel speaks to the model’s strategy to humour. It contains a cranky middle-aged man describing Currys’ merchandise utilizing Gen Z slang. It really works as a result of it’s acquainted. The irritable man is a well-worn archetype in British comedy (assume Bernard from Black Books or Mark from Peep Present), tapping into that archetype for humorous content material is an absolute winner.
Acquainted tropes like these are exactly what your model ought to be tapping into. Take into account doing a deep dive into British comedy to develop skits or characters which can be acquainted and can resonate together with your audiences.
Harmless drinks
Harmless Drinks have an off-the-wall however endearing model of humour.
They’ve a number of totally different sequence, and one of the well-liked is their “day within the life” sequence for Harmless workers.
Supply: Instagram
You will have come throughout day-in-the-life movies on LinkedIn highlighting hyper-productive blue-chip tech firm workers crushing their to-do lists in file time or influencers exhibiting their matcha lattes mornings and Pilates afternoons.
The sequence lampoons the sort of content material with way more reasonable, relatable day-in-the-life content material. It options workers stumbling by means of meeting-packed, unproductive work days.
The Reel above reveals an IT employee who spends his days “turning issues on and off”. One sharp commenter observed that this can be a callback to a joke from The IT Crowd. Once more, harkening again to well-known jokes or characters in British tradition is a successful formulation and one which you should use in your personal model technique.
Duolingo UK
Duolingo is well-known as a model that leans into humour constantly.
Supply: TikTok
On its UK TikTok account, Duolingo blends Gen Z TikTok absurdity with traditional absurdity present in British humour. TikTok humour is a troublesome nut to crack for a lot of manufacturers, and DuolingoUK is utilizing it to work together with the Gen Z market successfully.
On this video, they’re leaning into each the “demure” pattern and the matcha craze that’s sweeping Gen Z by making a mock-instructional video on “learn how to drink matcha in a demure manner”. It’s not forcing its model on the viewers, and there’s no hyperlink again to language-learning; Duolingo is utilizing humour alone to nurture its viewers.
Let your humour prepared the ground
Probably the most profitable manufacturers don’t deal with humour as a throwaway tactic. They weave it into their model voice, utilizing it to replicate their values, present confidence, and construct real connections with their viewers.
When used thoughtfully, humour does greater than spark fun—it builds belief, creates advocates, and retains your model prime of thoughts. The hot button is to plan, measure, and refine so your wit works as laborious as the remainder of your technique.
With Sprout Social, you possibly can plan, publish and measure each punchline—whereas Listening retains you in tune with viewers sentiment in actual time. Begin your 30-day free trial at the moment and see how a lot additional your wit can take you.
