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The ‘psychotic’ owl: Inside Duolingo’s unhinged marketing strategy

Duolingo’s unhinged approach in its marketing coupled with the personification of its mascot, Duo, has helped the brand stand out. Karandeep Singh Kapany, Regional Marketing Director, Duolingo India takes us through the brand’s marketing strategy and its meteoric rise.

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Harshal Thakur
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Ever seen a brand casually giving kidnapping threats to its consumers? Well, that's Duolingo for you. 

Known for its unhinged content, a trend that has recently started to rebel against the ‘boring tonality’ that brands take otherwise, Duolingo has been quick to find a niche with this Gen Z-favourite approach. 

But what's really unhinged? (Don't worry, our fellow millennial and Gen X friends, we struggle with Gen Z terms too)

An unhinged person is someone who stands out for their ‘crazy’ personality in a group of people. As per the youngest dictionary in town, Urban Dictionary, “unhinged is crazy cool… a little crazy, but entirely awesome at the same time.”

This crazy cool person owns their personality, calls a spade a spade and will go to extreme lengths to protect their true friends. 

Duo, the iconic green owl and mascot of Duolingo, has embodied this personality. Duo's all about encouragement and keeping it fun. Have you seen their app reminders? They're like little nudges from a friend who's a bit crazy, but in a good way. And that's the thing—Duo's unpredictability and humour makes learning feel like hanging out with a buddy rather than hitting the books.

Can a brand really go to extreme lengths for its loyal consumers? 

Yes, Duolingo is proof. See it for yourself:

Also, we repeat, it is just loyal, true consumers. Those sitting on the fence get casual threats from Duo.


What sets Duo apart is this irreverent and often unhinged approach. From playful reminders to downright absurd challenges, Duo breaks through the monotony of language learning with humor and unpredictability. 

With its wide-eyed gaze and quirky demeanor, Duo has a mixed spirit of adventure and learning. Duolingo has ingeniously leveraged Duo, weaving its character into the fabric of its brand identity. The mascot is present all over the brand’s social media. Duo seems like someone who belongs to (and with) Gen Z. The sly, sarcastic, and uncanny comments that the mascot engages in, seems to drive more engagement for the brand.

A lot of brands in recent times have been trying their hands at this unhinged approach in their marketing. Duolingo, however, seems to have cracked the formula, and it is evident through its growth in India in the last year. In the span of a year, the app’s social media presence in India has soared to 140K from 10K. 

Karandeep Singh Kapany, Regional Marketing Director, Duolingo India told Social Samosa that this success is attributed to various social media activities that the brand engages in; creating original content around popular, trending topics such as the Calvin Klein campaign and Dua Lipa’s visit to India. Along with that, Duolingo engages in meme marketing and conversations around trending topics. 

Kapany elaborates, “Our social media presence is characterized by being unhinged, allowing us to showcase our brand personality, for example, by using meme marketing authentically.”

“Moreover, our reactive approach to trending topics and conversations, like when Anand Mahindra tweeted about us, ensures that we stay relevant and maintain a dynamic presence on social media platforms, further fueling our growth and engagement. We also try not to take ourselves too seriously with our posts on social media, e.g. Duo hopping onto the trend of ‘I put the hot in the psychotic’. These strategies have collectively enabled Duolingo to become a cult brand on social media in India,” adds Kapany. 

Riding the social media wave

Duolingo India has been proactively leveraging Instagram to grow its popularity and increase user base. 

Kapany shares that the app’s Instagram marketing strategy involves several key elements, each crafted to entertain the audience while staying relevant and engaging. 

He says, “Firstly, we prioritize creating visually appealing content with relatable, humorous, or unexpected twists, ensuring each piece is enjoyable and impactful. Additionally, we actively participate in conversations and trends, fostering engagement with brands and individuals and celebrating our community through surprises. Duolingo embraces various subcultures such as Barbie, Kpop, anime, and even the Ganji Chudail lore, trending in India, catering to diverse interests within our audience.” 

Duolingo also regularly collaborates with influencers on Instagram, specifically catering to Gen Z. The influencers seem to match the unhinged approach and align with Duo’s way of conversing. 

However, taking an unhinged approach comes with its own challenges. Brands fight to win consumer trust and to win that, they have been taking an authoritative tone. If a brand pivots from this traditional modus operandi, do they face the risk of losing credibility? 

So, it has been important for Duo to maintain a balance between humor and earning educational credibility. Kapany says that strategy in balancing entertainment with educational credibility involves a meticulous blend. Humor is utilized to enhance learning experiences, each instance carefully crafted to highlight language learning's importance and benefits, he adds. By portraying Duolingo as an accessible and enjoyable tool, they emphasize that learning a language can be enriching and fun. This dual approach ensures their marketing engages audiences with humor and pop culture while emphasizing Duolingo's educational value, the Regional Marketing Director reveals. 

Explaining the content formats employed by the brand, he expounds, “In terms of content formats, Duolingo employs a variety of approaches, including Reel remixes, cosplay, trend hopping, user roasting, subtle reminders, and interactions with other brands, all aimed at maintaining audience engagement and entertainment. Also, we actively create content in response to user comments on our Instagram posts.” 

 

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The brand is also fairly active on X (formerly Twitter) and regularly posts visually-rich and engaging content. While the posts are majorly static, it maintains the tonality and the entertainment quotient of Duolingo’s Instagram strategy.

 

Employing humour

Duolingo’s marketing efforts capitalized on the growing popularity of the app and added fuel to it by launching a series of campaigns. Let's take a look at some of its recent campaigns. 

It launched the Swachh Bhasha Abhiyaan to promote accurate language usage on signboards. It consisted of two phases: first, Duo, the brand mascot, corrected errors with red markers and spray paint; second, inaccurate signs were replaced. The campaign went viral, with reel content garnering over 9M views organically and increasing follower base by 314%.

 

 

The second Indic course introduced on Duolingo was Bengali to English, highlighting the language's richness and ease of learning English. The campaign, ‘Ankhon Bangla Jaanle Engriji Eiji,’ strategically deployed across various platforms, resonated with Bangla speakers, leading to a 400% increase in active users post-launch. Through humor, food, and relatable scenarios, the campaign emphasized Duolingo's key product features. 

 

 

Duolingo launched its third Indic language course with the innovative campaign ‘Star Nunchi Global Star Kandi (Avandi)’, drawing inspiration from the Tollywood industry. The highlight was a 60-foot hand-painted poster, unveiled at a green carpet event, featuring Duo as a Tollywood superstar. The campaign included on-ground activations, a rap performance by Roll Rida, and a special event for Duo. These efforts generated significant social media buzz, with content garnering nearly 20 million views, reaching 9.5 million users, and engaging 1.3 million individuals.

 

 

Shedding light on the core marketing themes that Duolingo employs, Kapany shares, “Our efforts are always anchored around three core themes: fun, free, and effective. The messaging revolves around highlighting the enjoyable aspects of language learning, emphasizing the accessibility of Duolingo's platform with its free-to-use model, and showcasing the effectiveness of its teaching methods.”

Duo: the mascot reviving a dying art

India’s advertising landscape witnessed quite a few mascots back in the day–with several popular brands being associated with their respective mascots. However, with time, these have become an ebbing practice. Duolingo, however, has managed to revive this genre of marketing with their mascot. Duo has not only become synonymous with the brand, but a personified version of the brand itself–the mascot is not the voice of the brand, it has become the brand.  

“Duo, our unhinged green owl mascot, has indeed played a significant role in enhancing the brand's popularity. Renowned for embracing trends and memes such as Marshal the Mushroom, Duo has gained significant popularity for its eccentric appeal. We also look at capitalizing on the widespread appeal of popular shows and fandoms to encourage language learning,” reveals the Regional Marketing Director. 

He adds that the mascot will remain central to Duolingo’s marketing, saying, “As we continue to evolve, Duo remains a central and integral element in our marketing efforts, symbolizing the essence of fun and learning at Duolingo.”

Shedding light on the secret sauce of what makes Duo click with the audience, Kapany explains, “With a persona blending passive aggression, encouragement, and playful annoyance, Duo ensures user commitment to language learning goals. Using humor, sarcasm, and guilt through emails, push notifications, and real-life pranks, Duo effectively engages users, fostering a personal connection.”

 

 

Navigating metrics and brand partnerships

To gauge campaign effectiveness, Duolingo employs a range of metrics focused on acquiring new learners and building large communities of lifelong learners. Kapany shares that key metrics include tracking daily active users (DAUs) and monthly active users (MAUs), reflecting user growth and engagement. These metrics provide benchmarks for assessing campaign success in acquiring and retaining users. They also analyze campaign performance during critical periods like the back-to-school season to optimize efficiency. 

Talking about the surge in brand partnerships, Kapany shares that Duolingo leverages brand partnerships to access diverse consumer interests, expanding reach and engagement. He singles out collaborations with brands like Airbnb and Chess.com. “As the trend of apps serving as marketing platforms gains momentum, we remain open to exploring further cross-advertising opportunities with like-minded brands to offer enriching experiences to its user base,” he adds. 

A look at the future: Regional expansion, major events, and more 

Recently, Duolingo launched Telugu-to-English with a massive poster featuring Duo. With this, the brand has propelled its efforts in going regional.

Emphasizing regional marketing, Kapany shares that with localization and personalization, the app aims to enhance accessibility to English learning for learners in specific regions. This approach seeks to understand each market's unique needs and tailor language learning solutions accordingly, departing from a uniform approach, he further reveals. 

With several key events lined up this year, Duolingo needs to amplify its marketing with the help of these. The Regional Marketing Director shares, “We'll place a special emphasis on significant occasions such as the IPL, elections, and the upcoming T20 World Cup, recognizing the immense potential for engagement that these events offer. Our goal is to strategically align our efforts with these high-profile moments, showcasing the relevance of language learning in the context of India's dynamic cultural landscape. The integration of our mascots, Duo and the recently introduced Lily, into trending moments, will further amplify our brand presence and user engagement.” 

Lastly, illuminating the future goals of Duolingo, Kapany says that the brand aims to foster a lively social community, highlighting the enjoyable, gamified aspect of their learning app. “Furthermore, we aim to enhance our educational offerings, introduce more localized courses for India, and democratize language learning,” he adds. 

By taking themselves a bit less seriously, Duolingo has set itself apart from others. Apart from gaining fans for its mascot Duo, now the platform has set its eyes on regional markets. When a brand comes with a sharp bird-eye view, this may not really be a challenge. And it is going to be fun to watch Duo speak more regional Indian languages. Fly away, little birdie! 

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