Be More Doge: What Marketers Can Learn from the Internet’s Favourite Shiba Inu

At Zeal, I can think of only one way to get a collective response in Slack that doesn’t involve extinguishing some kind of real or metaphorical fire.

That is, dog content.
Ok, cat content works too, but I digress.

International Doge Day is the 2nd of November, and I’ve been elected to write about it.

Specifically, what our obsession is with these little furry characters, and what as marketers, we can learn and apply to our own brand-building efforts.

As a proud millennial and brand strategy nerd, I can think of no greater honour.

The dawn of Doge

For those who are not chronically online, Doge is the internet’s pet name *ahem* for Kabosu, a Shiba Inu who became meme royalty in 2010 when her owner, Atsuko Sato, a Japanese blogger, began sharing posts of daily life with her beloved rescue dog.

Before long, images of Kabosu emerged on Tumblr and 4chan adorned with her amusing inner monologues in colourful Comic Sans and signature ‘dog speak’ broken English.

At a time when you could unironically say YOLO, eat straight cinnamon for views, and Mumford & Sons had us in a chokehold, Doge represented peak humour.

And just like that, the internet changed forever.

So popular was Doge, that in 2013, her face became the official logo of DogeCoin, a cryptocurrency that went on to hit a multi-billion dollar market cap.

Then there’s ownthedoge.com, a collective endorsed by Atsuko on a mission to D.O.G.E (Do Only Good Everyday), donating over $2 million dollars to Save the Children and various animal charities.

Kabosu sadly passed away in 2024, but her image and influence continue to shape internet culture through endless spin-offs, permutations, and iterations today.

Swole Doge, anyone?

Moving on.

Doge is a masterclass in organic cultural stickiness.

But why do animals hold such an absurd amount of staying power in people’s minds, and how can we harness that same emotional pull in our marketing?

Spoiler: we’ve been doing it for centuries.

Why great brand ideas have legs

Long before Doge memes graced our feeds, brands were using animals and mascots to conquer human psychology and cosy up to consumers.

From the Michelin Man (1898) and The Laughing Cow (1921), to our nation’s favourite insurance pedalling meerkats (2009).

Behavioral science tells us that these characters tap into anthropomorphism—our innate human tendency to project emotions, traits, and intentions onto animals, objects, and natural phenomena.

In marketing speak, mascots hit the holy trinity of brand-building metrics that correlate with growth and influence decision-making.

1. Fame: how readily a brand springs to mind in buying moments (sometimes called brand salience or mental availability)
2. Feeling: the emotional response the brand evokes
3. Fluency: the speed and ease at which a consumer can link an asset to a brand

In action: “I need car insurance. Meerkat brand funny. I feel good about meerkat brand. Compare the Market is good enough for me.”

Simples.

Make Mascots Cool Again

Tragically, somewhere along the line, by no fault of their own, mascots lost their mojo.

Partly, this is because we got hooked on the cheap dopamine hits offered by performance marketing, and partly because it’s hard to convince a CFO that a puffy humanoid made of tyres or a hysterical laughing cow is a solid use of marketing funds when they expect every penny to yield an exact and highly predictable return.

Then, a Russian meerkat comes along and revitalises a dull as ditchwater category, reminding us that actually mascots are still just as effective at driving growth and profitability as they’ve always been.

Image Credit: Ocean Outdoor

The numbers don’t lie

Joint research from System1 and IPA Databank led by Orlando Wood, proves that brand-owned characters consistently outperform abstract logos and human talent:

• +37% likelihood of driving market share growth
• +30% likelihood of boosting long-term profitability
• 12x more likely to capture high audience attention
• +25% increase in brand recall and up to 50% longer ad dwell time
• Higher short-term sales spikes than celebrity-fronted campaigns

The real kicker, and something I love to tell the brands we work with, is that consumers use assets like mascots to choose brands regardless of whether that brand is the optimal choice.

The average consumer isn’t carefully evaluating every insurance comparison site to determine which is the fastest, most powerful, or feature-rich.

Instead, they go with their gut to make a “good enough choice” based on how they feel, and the limited information they have available.

In other words, your brand can get ahead of competitors for the simple fact that you have a familiar character that makes people feel good.

Creating a Titan of the trade

Animal mascots can really prove their strategic muscle in B2B, technical, or ‘low-interest’ categories where emotional engagement is notoriously scarce.

For Tite-Fix, a brand of screws aimed at tradies, we introduced a mascot to great effect.