The meme phenomenon in the creative strategy of Netflix Spain on Twitter

Abstract

The objective of this study is to determine what creative use Netflix Spain makes of audience-capturing memes to promote its contents on Twitter, chosen for its public nature, broad-ranging influence and growing reach. The main objective is to evaluate whether the memes lead to a level of engagement that makes their contents go viral. The specific objectives are: to measure the level of attraction that shared memes generate compared with other resources published by Netflix Spain on its Twitter account (@NetflixES), to analyse which formats and contents result in the most retweets, likes and replies, and to identify for which communication goals the memes are used. The study uses a mixed quantitative and qualitative methodology, with a sample of 112 memes from 307 publications from the fourth quarter of 2019. Findings: memes result in the third-biggest form of attraction after emoticons and weblinks; there is no direct connection between the most frequently used formats (visual text, image macro and video clip) and the most interactive formats (graphic, collage and video clip). Memes are published with the goal of promoting the Netflix brand and its catalogue as well as to generate discussion among users. It is concluded that memes are a preferred form of communication in the creative strategy of Netflix Spain. They are a highly powerful form of attraction that creates emotional ties between the Netflix platform and its users.