There's a long-standing belief in marketing that brands should stay in their lane, speaking only to what they sell and what they know best. But culture doesn't move in lanes. It moves fast and invites participation. Audiences switch platforms every 47 seconds, so relevance can't be planned months out; it must be caught in the moment. Think Double Dutch: There's an art to timing your entry, but once you're in, you're part of the energy. The brands gaining ground give themselves permission to mine culture and show up in ways that entertain and feel human.
Look at Aesthetic Family Dental Care in Chandler, Arizona. Instead of clinical messaging, the practice fills its feed with fun videos: dentists doing physical comedy, playing with the equipment, pulling the whole staff into the bit. Their brand isn't about dental procedures; it's about personalities. The National Park Service does the opposite: no on-camera staff, just beautiful photography and long, educational captions that use humor to spotlight quirky animal behavior and keep visitors safe. One brand leads with people, the other with place. The dentist defies what you'd expect from a dental practice; the Park Service leans into the wonder it already owns, in a voice that feels human instead of bureaucratic.
Want to apply similar strategies to grow your brand’s social presence? Here are three tips:
Trade relevance for relatability. Stop filtering every idea by how directly it ties to what you sell. Audiences respond to what feels real, to content that mirrors how people actually think and feel. Humor and emotional honesty build a connection that product-led messaging rarely achieves on its own.
Find the moment, then time your entry. Not every trend is worth chasing, but every brand can find where its audience intersects with what's happening around them. Look past the content calendar to behaviors and emotional cues. Then recognize when to step in, and have the confidence to do it in a way that feels natural.
Choose presence over polish. This is where brands hesitate: Is it too off-brand? Will it undermine credibility? More often, the bigger risk is staying invisible by playing it safe. The goal isn't to abandon your brand. It's to expand how it shows up.