Best Corporate April Fools’ Day Pranks

In the age of viral marketing, savvy businesses are looking to April Fools’ Day as a way to get free publicity and marketing.

Businesses frequently use April Fools’ Day to deceive their customers with phony announcements or items.
Social media enables these stunts to become viral and expand the company’s exposure.
An effective April Fools’ Day hoax can increase awareness of a company’s goods and overall brand, but these practical jokes can also backfire.
This article is for entrepreneurs and marketers searching for instances of huge organizations’ successful April 1st practical jokes.
Except on April Fools’ Day, intentionally deceiving customers is typically bad for business. While brand shenanigans have diminished in recent years due to the severity of the COVID-19 epidemic, businesses are gradually reviving the custom.

Through amusing PR gimmicks, absurd goods, and fake news, Businesses may create some buzz by using social media marketing strategically and becoming viral. Even though they are funny, these fake advertisements are a part of a larger marketing plan to highlight a company’s ethos and direct people to its actual items.

Velveeta gets in on the skincare trend

In 2021, the company Velveeta, best known for its meltable cheese, introduced a range of cheesy skin care products via a social media video. In an advertisement that said, “The creaminess of Velveeta, now in skin care,” a serum, daily moisturiser, and night cream were among the goods highlighted. Velveeta by V.

The business went a step further by asking prospective customers to register with their names and email addresses in order to get notifications when the items became available. Even though the items were plainly bogus, the waitlist worked well to increase the company’s email marketing contact list and produce sales leads.

Burger King unveils the Chocolate Whopper

Twenty years after Burger King introduced its “Left-Handed Whopper” on April Fool’s Day, the fast-food company’s marketing struck once again in March 2018. This time, the menu prank included a Chocolate Whopper, where white chocolate rings served as the onions and syrup served as ketchup. The flame-grilled chocolate patty was introduced in a 30-second movie, and it came with milk chocolate lettuce leaves and candied blood orange slices on top. It was the perfect burger for those who have an extreme sweet craving. But who knows—maybe not.

Taco Bell buys the Liberty Bell

Remember when Taco Bell purchased the Liberty Bell when we were talking about ridiculous fast food? Back in 1996, when the business published a full-page ad in six important newspapers, it appeared as such. The advertisement announced that the well-known national symbol’s name will change, but don’t worry: The Taco Liberty Bell would still be on exhibit for the public to enjoy. The transfer of ownership was allegedly done to lower the national debt. That admirable objective failed to impress the irate people who complained to the National Park Service, including staffers from the offices of two US senators.

The hoax was highly effective, creating attention that was worth several times the price of the ad space despite the outraged public (and the harassed National Park Service staff who had to calm them). When former press secretary Mike McCurry revealed that the acquisition was a component of a continuing privatisation drive, the White House joined in on the joke as well. He stated that Ford Motor Company was renovating the Lincoln Memorial, which would thereafter be renamed “the Lincoln-Mercury Memorial.”

PayPal lets you print money

Using the PayPal app, clients may now print money directly from their phones in 2018, according to a tweet from the credit card processing business PayPal. A mobile ATM might soon be another convenience provided by cellphones, although the technology is not quite there yet. However, the business’s humorous tweet did go viral, resulting in a flood of new users for its mobile app and a rise in brand recognition.

eHarmony finds love for dogs

It’s difficult to determine how man’s best friend and canines fared prior to eHarmony resolving the issue of canine dating. After helping people form committed relationships for over 20 years, eHarmony CEO Grant Langston launched the Furever Love feature on April 1, 2018. It was the goal of the Canine Compatibility Companion Service to place puppies in committed relationships. The hoax included posts from two potential dates for dogs: Kona, a hopeless romantic searching for a monogamous tug-of-war partner, and Johnny Cash, a little dog hoping for a long-term commitment.

The release stated that eHarmony’s canine algorithms were based on reliable research, including information from a scholarly paper on “Love and Canine Relationships in America” and a custom “bark and tail wag measurement” scale.

Amazon delivers authors

How about having your favourite author visit you in the comfort of your own living room? On April 1, 2018, Amazon Publishing promoted that in a tweet. Patricia Cornwell, a best-selling crime author, was seen in the promotional film going above and beyond to complete a fan’s purchase. The journey from Cornwell’s boat to the client’s front door is the stuff of action films—and expertly staged April 1st stunts.

BBC reports on spaghetti tree

This hoax, which CNN named the greatest news media hoax of all time, is proof that you don’t need a lot of technology to pull off a classic April Fool’s joke. When a report from Switzerland was featured on the BBC’s current events programme Panorama in 1957, that is what they did. The three minutes of video, which was viewed by an estimated 8 million people, purported to show a family gathering pasta from their backyard spaghetti tree. According to the official narrator, the harvest was a big success because of the good weather and the “virtual elimination of the spaghetti weevil.”

In the 1950s, “spaghetti” was not a common word in the United Kingdom. That may help to explain why a large number of Britons fell for the prank and contacted the BBC for tips on how to grow their own.

Sam’s Club introduces bulkcoin

Some April Fool’s jokes rely on the timing of their practical jokes to fool the populace. That was Sam’s Club’s strategy when it unveiled “bulkcoin,” its own cryptocurrency, on April 1, 2018.

The warehouse club’s corporate website declared that “the world of currency is fast evolving, and Sam’s Club just forced its way to the front of the line.” “The value-seeking members weren’t satisfied with the bitcoins, litecoins, and teeny-tiny coins.”

The website supported this ironic claim with a video showing the bulkcoin payment procedure and a special deal of 2,400 bulkcoin packs for $19.98, which it said could “stabilise the hella wild market.”

Elon Musk falls off the wagon

Many people pay attention to Elon Musk’s tweets, some of whom were not amused by the Tesla CEO’s string of messages on April 1, 2018.

The tweets announcing Tesla’s impending bankruptcy began with a promise of “major news in a few hours” and ended with a picture of a slept Musk with his head resting on a Model 3.

There are several bankruptcy chapters, and since Tesla has *all* of them, including Chapter 14 and a half (the worst one), as critics have rightfully pointed out, according to Musk’s tweet.

In 2018, April Fools’ Day happened on a Sunday. Although many people saw Musk’s tweets as a clear joke, Tesla’s shares plunged 5% the next morning when the markets opened. Fortunately for Musk and Tesla, stock prices.

Using April Fools’ Day to your small business’s advantage

By taking inspiration from the aforementioned examples, you may create your own April Fools’ Day joke to delight your clients. Your article can end up becoming viral and bringing a lot of attention to your business. Be mindful of your audience and what they could find humorous, though, or you risk finding yourself in the middle of a PR maelstrom. To make your target audience more inclined to laugh with you and even tell their friends, think about making it lighthearted and humorous.