Mascots in Digital Marketing: Evolution or Extinction?

Few elements of the marketing ecosystem have stood the test of time like the brand mascot. From the golden era of television right through to the digital age, many of these characters have endured as more than just cute or quirky faces – they’ve been integral to building brand identity, fostering consumer loyalty, and differentiating products in an overloaded market. 

But as we journey further down the rabbit hole of digital transformation and hyper-personalisation, a pressing question arises: do brand mascots still hold the same sway over consumers, or are they becoming relics of a bygone era? 

On the surface it may seem like the pull of brand mascots is waning. As marketing strategies shift towards data-driven, personalised experiences, the idea of a single character being able to embody a diverse consumer base can seem not only outdated, but impossible. Yet, as some of our contributors suggest, this perspective might be short-sighted – noting the potential of brand mascots is far from depleted; instead, it’s evolving. 

We spoke to industry experts to gauge the current pulse of these beloved icons. Here’s what they had to say.

Richard Harriford

Group planning director, VCCP and author of ‘Cracking the Memory Code’

To succeed, brands must fit into social culture, but that's not enough – they must also stand out. And the more brands try to look like they belong in social, the more they start to look like each other.

It’s marketing 101: Don’t look like the other guy.

Marketers need to ensure their brands are memorable at the right moments, for the right things. That’s the only real link between what we do in brand marketing and what actually happens in the market (at the till or at the search bar).

So how do you get remembered?

Brand characters and sonic devices may have fallen out of fashion. But, as we found when we tested them with Cowry Consulting, they’re still a shortcut to being memorable. In fact, nearly half of the most memorable assets we tested were character driven.

The fact that fewer people are using brand mascots only makes them more of a competitive advantage. We’ve also found that with new technology like gen AI and a huge amount of human talent it’s becoming easier to deploy brand mascots on digital channels. AI creative agency faith’s Bubl Generator that they made for O2 is a great example, as are the digital twins that Bernadette has made for low-cost social deployment of brand mascots.

It has never been easier to populate your brand world with character if you’re smart about it.

If you’re worried about brand characters being out of fashion (to butcher the words of Coco Chanel) “advertising fashion changes, but brand memorability endures”.

Clara Marensi

Strategic planner at Ogilvy Spain

In the 1950s, Kellogg’s pioneered the use of mascots like Tony the Tiger and Toucan Sam, creating strong brand recognition and emotional connections. Icons like Ronald McDonald and the Duracell Bunny instantly evoke their brands. Today, however, things are changing. The real question now is how consumer-brand connections are being redefined. With digital communication, interactivity, and a demand for authenticity, mascots must adapt to remain relevant and continue strengthening brand-consumer bonds.

The challenge for brand mascots is not only how to evolve and adapt to current needs but also how to do so without losing their essence. If we define a brand mascot as a character, animal, or caricatured object – then Wendy's is a prime example of how to do this successfully. In recent years, the red-haired girl with braids, inspired by the founder's daughter, has been transformed into a brand character that radically updated customer perception and experience. With a tone that is witty and with just the right touch of irreverence, Wendy's has effectively capitalised on digital platforms through TikTok challenges, creative responses to Twitter followers, memes targeting competitors, and even appearances in the Fortnite video game.

This is an effective brand strategy that, by leveraging its mascot, has reinforced recognition, differentiated itself in a saturated market, and generated loyalty and emotional connection with consumers.

However, not all mascots are a reimagining of the past. Many brands are bold enough to launch new characters to connect with their audiences. For example, at Ogilvy Barcelona, we launched a campaign called ‘Nut Tunes’ to promote the consumption of nuts and their health benefits. It was an initiative created entirely with artificial intelligence, where we brought different nuts to life as urban music stars.

James Treen

Senior social strategist at Recipe

We all know the power a well-established mascot can bring to a brand in helping it build meaningful awareness, association and connection with audiences. In an increasingly crowded media space, it may feel as if mascot brands have started to disappear, leaving an impression that they may be a relic from a bygone era of TV dominant advertising. But this is far from the case. What has actually changed is how and when you use the brand mascot, rather than questioning why to use them. Social media in recent years has shown that the key trick is in how you successfully adapt mascots to digital spaces, ensuring that they are relevant and relatable enough to engage modern audiences.

Mascots have been key to delivering a successful TikTok strategy in recent years, especially for FMCG and low interest brands. Look no further than the success of DuoLingo or Sour Patch Kids on TikTok to see how the brand mascot is very much alive and well in 2024, with brands leaning on delivering entertainment via their mascots to build meaningful connections with audiences.

The social landscape is interactive, unlike the passive media broadcast environments that mascots used to only live in, which actually favours the use of characters in storytelling and experimentation. Wendy’s are a great example of a brand who have used their mascot to explore tone of voice through humourous social dialogue on X with vicious responses or roasting audiences but they have also used it to star in AR, VR and gaming experiences, such as when they launched their mascot on Fortnite. This has helped them provide memorable brand experiences and build distinction within a crowded media landscape. Although McDonald’s don’t use Ronald any more in their marketing efforts, they still leverage other well established heritage mascots when the time is right, as seen with the recent success of their ‘Grimace Shake’. Grimace the purple monster was resurrected and reintroduced by McDonald’s to younger audiences due to gen Z’s love for nostalgia, who in turn gave it new life with their absurdist humour.

Looking ahead, AI may open up completely new opportunities for how brand mascots could evolve into the next chapter of social and digital. Unlike human representatives, who may face the risk of scandal, virtual mascots remain a safer, consistent face of a brand, capable of connecting with audiences for decades to come. Recently we have seen the likes of O2 invest in gen-AI tools that allow client prompts to generate custom mascot imagery for use in marketing creations.

Ultimately, Mascots are here to stay and will continue to deliver on their role of building meaningful awareness and offering distinction when adapted successfully to new environments.

Tom Anderson

Managing partner at davies+mckerr 

I love a brand mascot.

I feel like my childhood was populated by figures like The Honey Monster, Tony the Tiger and Peperami’s Animal. But the idea that we as a nation will sit down to watch some unifying TV (and the ads) feels about as distant in time as me thinking that eating three hot Peperamis constituted a decent tea.

This means those uniting, fun characters that help people identify and engage with brands are also a thing of the past, right? But then I look at the landscape and the meerkats are still going strong, the M&M’s are on TV, Captain Birdseye has been given a glow-up, Gio Compario is on Strictly and Snap, Crackle & Pop are still on my kids’ cereals.

The biggest pitfall a brand can fall into is to try and use a mascot to shortcut to success, but its role and reason for being aren’t linked to a tighter strategic thought. In which case, they can fall into the trap of feeling childish and frivolous.

Most of those have been around for years, so maybe it’s hard to launch a new mascot into this fractured media world. When budgets are squeezed and clients want the latest ‘thing’ it’s quite tricky to offer up an advertising construct that’s anchored in ‘days of yore’. But if you’ve got a character with real personality and ties in with your brand, I think people are still receptive to them.