#LoveWins and So Do These Brands

The morning of Friday, June 26th, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) legalized same-sex marriage nationwide. By 3 PM that afternoon, there were 2.6 million tweets using the hashtag #LoveWins, and that number has now surpassed 6.2 million.

President Obama’s tweet regarding the ruling incited the viral movement.

Photo courtesy of International Business Times

Many brands capitalized on this momentous occasion and made use of real-time marketing, both on social and elsewhere. Jell-O curated Twitter content that was fun in the spirit of the occasion (see below). Other brands like Target, Ben and Jerry’s, MasterCard and many more quickly created branded, and often rainbow-colored, images and GIFs to share on social. Even Hillary Clinton intelligently joined in on the virality, appealing to her left-wing supporters by tweeting a photo with the caption “Proud” early on Friday morning.

Photo courtesy of AdWeek

Uber joined in on the trend with a subtle rainbow tail to show that a driver was available on the app. This nod to Pride Month made for a simple but effective marketing strategy that had users sharing pictures of the Uber app on various social media networks.

Photo courtesy of AdWeek

However, Chipotle’s “¿Homo Estás?” tweet and coupons did not go over as well with its audience. Some disgruntled Twitter users felt as if Chipotle’s attempt to market in real-time was insensitive.

Brands should learn from these real-time marketing masters, as well as from some of their mistakes, and keep an eye out for the next trending topic to join in on, keeping in mind that the most effective messages were simple and tugged on the heartstrings.