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Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) Guide

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is transforming how brands show up in AI-powered search. Explore insights, strategies, and best practices to help your content rank and resonate across conversational engines like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Copilot.

Explore insights and strategies for Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) to help your brand stay visible and discoverable in AI-powered search.

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) Blog Collection | Meltwater

Media monitoring helps organizations stay informed about what’s being said across online news, print, broadcast, podcasts, and other media channels. Whether you're tracking brand mentions, measuring PR performance, monitoring competitors, or identifying emerging trends, our expert guides, best practices, and industry insights will help you build a smarter media monitoring strategy and make more informed communications decisions.

Discover expert media monitoring guides, best practices, and industry insights to track brand mentions, monitor competitors, and stay ahead of the news.

Media Monitoring: Guides, Best Practices & Industry Insights

Every day billions of conversations take place on social media: tweets, posts, comments, blogs, reviews, podcasts, and much more.

Learn how to use social listening to make sense of all of that data.

On our social listening category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around social listening and social media monitoring. Read more.

Social Listening Blogs | Category

Business Reputation Management: What does it take to add reputation management to your marketing strategy? More importantly, how do you keep your reputation sparkly and shiny? Here’s your all-access guide to online reputation management for the long term.

On our reputation management category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around business reputation management. Read more.

Reputation Management Blogs | Category

From your brand's logo to your website, your social media presence to your customer support—these elements combined are what constitutes a brand in the minds of customers. But, there are thousands of other businesses that have a logo, website, social media presence, and website. So, how can you position your business on the market and make it stand out from the competition?

The key to success is branding & brand management!

On our brand management category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around brand management. Build your strategy and reach your goals!

Brand Management Blogs | Category

Competitive intelligence and the act of collecting competitive data can be seen as growth drivers for a company. Our guide will help you understand the concept of competitive intelligence (CI) by answering questions such as: What is the definition of competitive intelligence? How is competitive intelligence useful to organizations? What is the goal of competitive intelligence? And more.

On our competitive intelligence category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around competitive intelligence. Learn how to stay ahead.

Competitive Intelligence Blogs | Category

Let’s dive into the customer journey framework and how to optimize the process by creating a customer journey map and using metrics that matter when analyzing the customer journey.

On our customer journey category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around mapping and understanding the customer journey.

Customer Journey Blogs | Category

How do customers interact with my newly launched product?

How do I increase the productivity of my employees?

How do I know if my marketing efforts are working?

We have just two words for you...Data analytics!

On our data analytics category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around AI and data analytics. Technical and still easy to understand.

AI & Data Analytics Blogs | Category

Public relations and media relations can add impact to any marketing strategy. It’s an opportunity for brands to grow their reach beyond traditional sales messages. PR helps to shape the image you want people to have of your brand.

So, what is PR and how do you use it? This guide shows you everything you need to know to build a strong public relations foundation.

On our public relations (PR) category page, you find all our blogs covering public relations and communications topics. Step up your PR game.

Public Relations (PR) Blogs | Category

We all know exactly what the roles of sales or accounting are in a company, right? We might even have a slight idea of what the IT guys are doing.

But there is another business discipline, that plays a crucial role in organizations, even more so during the pandemic – internal communications!

But what exactly do we mean by that, what purpose does it serve and what steps can you take to ensure you and your employees will communicate effectively?

On our internal communications category page, you find all our blogs about internal comms topics. Learn about the intranet, internal newsletters, and more.

Internal Communications Blogs | Category

As the internet has taken root in more areas of our lives — everything from entertainment to shopping to paying bills and more — traditional marketing is becoming less impactful. As any marketer knows, you need to focus on where your audience is if you want to reach them. Since the average person spends about seven hours a day online, it’s no surprise that content has maintained its hold on marketers.

Here's a closer look at what content marketing is and why it matters more than ever in our digital-first economy.

On our content marketing category page, you find blogs about content marketing topics. Learn about strategies, KPIs, tips, and more. Make your content king!

Content Marketing Blogs | Category

The rise of the influencer marketing space – today a $10 billion industry, growing 50% per year – is one of the clearest examples of how social media is transforming traditional marketing. These days having a business website, presence on social, PR coverage, and your own content isn’t enough to compete.

We'll dive into the intricacies of influencer marketing to help ensure that you're equipped with the insights needed to be successful in this space.

On our influencer marketing category page, you find blogs about influencer marketing topics. Build your strategy, find influencers, and measure results.

Influencer Marketing Blogs | Category

Have you just launched a new product or service that you want to get the word out about? Maybe you want to share with consumers why it is awesome and how it is so much better than the one your competitors offer.

Well, then, there is one thing you can't do without...Marketing!

On our marketing category page, you find blogs about marketing topics. Learn about all the different angles and types of marketing and improve your results.

Marketing Blogs | Category

In this guide, we want to give you a peek into the definition of social media management, the daily schedule of a social media manager, social media platforms to promote your business, and the do’s & don’ts of social media management.

Are you ready to begin the journey of becoming a social media superstar?

On our social media management category page, you find blogs about social media management topics. Build and manage your online community.

Social Media Management Blogs | Category

Building a following and using social media platforms to reach a wider audience requires a well-planned social media marketing strategy. In this guide, we’ll be looking at why social media marketing is so essential and how you can make it work for your business.

On our social media marketing category page, you find blogs about social media marketing topics. Learn how to get the highest paid social ROI!

Social Media Marketing Blogs | Category

In the fast-evolving realm of digital marketing and public relations, utilizing the right tools is crucial for success. Our interdisciplinary category showcases all the pertinent tools for digital marketing & PR. These tools help in enhancing your online presence and effectively reaching target groups, whether through reputation management, influencer marketing, or social media management.

On our digital marketing and PR tools category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around mapping and understanding the customer journey.

Digital Marketing & PR Tools Blogs | Category

AI adoption is no longer the challenge—trusted context is. Most organizations have AI tools, but many still rely on disconnected, stale, or unverified data, limiting the quality and trustworthiness of AI-generated outputs. Meltwater MCP brings trusted, real-time intelligence into AI assistants.

Your Best Context is Already in the Room

Today, PR teams aren’t just tracking media coverage and share of voice. They’re also measuring how their brand shows up in AI-generated answers, search summaries, and large language models (LLMs). This new LLM visibility layer is quickly becoming a critical part of PR performance.

15 Must-Have PR KPIs and How to Track Them

See how one platform can power every decision across PR, communications, and marketing.

The Meltwater Blog

Blog Topics: Generative Engine Optimization, Media Intelligence, Media Relations, Social Listening, Consumer Intelligence, Influencer Marketing

Find out how you can leverage Facebook to boost your brand's online presence and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

Facebook Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage Instagram to boost your brand's visual appeal and gain a competitive edge. Explore our category page today!

Instagram Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage LinkedIN to grow your professional network and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

LinkedIn Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage TikTok to elevate your brand with creative content and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

TikTok Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage X / Twitter to engage your audience effectively and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

X / Twitter Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage YouTube to create engaging video content and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

YouTube Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage LinkedIn to grow your professional network and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

Every day billions of conversations take place on social media: tweets, posts, comments, blogs, reviews, podcasts, and much more.
Learn how to use social listening to make sense of all of that data.

From your brand's logo to your website, your social media presence to your customer support—these elements combined are what constitutes a brand in the minds of customers. But, there are thousands of other businesses that have a logo, website, social media presence, and website. So, how can you position your business on the market and make it stand out from the competition?
The key to success is branding & brand management!

What Is Data Analytics?
How can I grow my business? 
How do customers interact with my newly launched product?
How do I increase the productivity of my employees?
How do I know if my marketing efforts are working?
We have just two words for you...Data analytics!

Public relations and media relations can add impact to any marketing strategy. It’s an opportunity for brands to grow their reach beyond traditional sales messages. PR helps to shape the image you want people to have of your brand.
So, what is PR and how do you use it? This guide shows you everything you need to know to build a strong public relations foundation.

We all know exactly what the roles of sales or accounting are in a company, right? We might even have a slight idea of what the IT guys are doing.
But there is another business discipline, that plays a crucial role in organizations, even more so during the pandemic – internal communications!
But what exactly do we mean by that, what purpose does it serve and what steps can you take to ensure you and your employees will communicate effectively?

As the internet has taken root in more areas of our lives — everything from entertainment to shopping to paying bills and more — traditional marketing is becoming less impactful. As any marketer knows, you need to focus on where your audience is if you want to reach them. Since the average person spends about seven hours a day online, it’s no surprise that content has maintained its hold on marketers.
Here's a closer look at what content marketing is and why it matters more than ever in our digital-first economy.

The rise of the influencer marketing space – today a $10 billion industry, growing 50% per year – is one of the clearest examples of how social media is transforming traditional marketing. These days having a business website, presence on social, PR coverage, and your own content isn’t enough to compete.
We'll dive into the intricacies of influencer marketing to help ensure that you're equipped with the insights needed to be successful in this space.

Have you just launched a new product or service that you want to get the word out about? Maybe you want to share with consumers why it is awesome and how it is so much better than the one your competitors offer.
Well, then, there is one thing you can't do without...Marketing!

In this guide, we want to give you a peek into the definition of social media management, the daily schedule of a social media manager, social media platforms to promote your business, and the do’s & don’ts of social media management.
Are you ready to begin the journey of becoming a social media superstar?

The digital world plays a significant role in modern life, but since the COVID-19 pandemic, in-person events have gained a new level of importance. From the rise of run clubs to the resurgence of book clubs, IRL activities are filling a very real need for interpersonal engagement away from screens. Relatedly, experiential marketing and in-person events are brands’ secret weapons for driving engagement and finding differentiation in crowded marketplaces. Sometimes that looks like an attention-grabbing spectacle. For example, consider the Apple TV+ show Severance’s viral installation in Grand Central Station featuring the real-life cast of the show or Louis Vuitton’s viral activation last fall, when it transformed its flagship building in New York City into a stack of its iconic trunks, cleverly camouflaging construction scaffolding. 

Dig into more high fashion marketing activations in our Luxury Fashion Influencer Benchmarking Snapshot.

In a similar vein, in-person activations can also look like localized events and pop-ups that bring consumers and/or influencers together. Take the week-long, pop-up diner Cheez-It hosted in Upstate New York last spring or Miu Miu’s annual Summer Reads events, hosted this year in Beijing, Hong Kong, Milan, Osaka, and Paris. 

We used our social listening capabilities to see what social media buzz can tell marketers about the buzz around in-person events, as well as one app catering to them, Partiful.

 Social media buzz around in-person events is growing in 2025

In the first half of 2025, social media mentions of several categories of in-person events have increased. For example, discussions of board game and trivia nights, which had the highest volume of mentions (nearly 8,000 across 17 social channels), increased by 2% from January to June 2025, compared to the six months prior. In the same time period, buzz about speed dating events increased by 22%, but with only about a tenth of the volume of mentions.

There were over 4,400 social media mentions of in-person book clubs in the first half of 2025.

Particularly interesting is the buzz around IRL book clubs. Social media mentions were 14% higher in the first half of 2025 than they were in the second half of 2024, while engagement was 23% higher, indicating rising interest. For an example of how to hop onto the buzz around IRL clubs and events, look to Miu Miu’s previously mentioned Summer Reads activation. While attending influencers got to enjoy the events held at beautiful locations, their content generated excitement among their followers. 

This Instagram post from French singer Louane from MiuMiu’s Summer Reads event at the National Library of France generated nearly $23,000 in Estimated Media Value (EMV). 

Similarly, La Colombe and OkCupid’s Love Over Lattes singles happy hour events earlier this year, held in partnership with local influencers in three U.S. cities, tapped into the spirit of Valentine’s Day. This post by Kate Lazarski, hosting influencer of the Chicago Love Over Lattes event, generated about $11,600 in EMV. 

In each case, brands used events seemingly disconnected from their products to reinforce the community aspect of their brand identities and foster loyalty in the process. Though the discussion remains niche, many brands and consumers alike are showing renewed appetite for offline connections. Expect forward-thinking brands to get even more creative with in-person activations and partnerships as this trend continues to grow and evolve. 

Social media mentions of Partiful increased by 107% in H1 2025 compared to H2 2024.

Growing interest in in-person events and experiences is mirrored in the popularity of party-planning app Partiful. Launched in 2020, it now reports about 500,000 monthly active users, up 400% YoY according to one estimate. 

Our analysis found that social media mentions of Partiful in the first half of 2025 were more than double those in the six months prior. Spikes in conversation centered on jokes and memes (one of which the brand turned into social content of its own), as well as Apple’s February launch of its competitive app Apple Invites, highlighting Partiful’s growing place in popular culture. 

News and broadcast mentions of Partiful increased by a third in H1 2025 compared to H2 2024.

Additionally, the app has had strong visibility in traditional media; its news and broadcast mentions increased by 33% in the first half of 2025 compared to the six months prior. Some of its furthest-reaching news mentions included those in articles about a viral cake picnic in San Francisco, the growing popularity of in-person board game clubs, and NYC watch parties for the Women’s NCAA March Madness Tournament, among many others. 

Overall, the rise of Partiful and Apple Invites signals a broader consumer shift towards seeking out meaningful, IRL connections. Brands that can tap into that excitement, like Instacart and Pizza Hut already have, will have a distinct edge on their competitors.

What can marketers learn from the rise of in-person events in 2025?

Overall, there are a few key lessons that marketers can take away from the social listening data on in-person events:

Use digital connections to foster real-world ones. Whether working with influencers or partnering with apps and organizations, brands can use their existing digital marketing infrastructure to create IRL events and activations that get noticed. In particular, events that build on brand identity with creative and indirect approaches are surefire ways to stand out, especially if attendees have ample opportunities to create and share UGC.

Experiences are marketing must-haves. Promotions and activations that bring people together give brands the chance to engage with consumers in concrete ways, reinforcing their presence and driving brand loyalty. In turn, marketers can use such events to hear directly from the consumers themselves. Along with using events for promotion, brands can use them for invaluable feedback that they may not have access to otherwise.

Influencers deliver intimacy at scale. In-person events can only reach so many people, but influencer attendees and hosts help followers near and far experience them vicariously. Choose your content creator partnerships carefully and strategically to leverage in-person activations to reach new audiences.

What Marketers Can Learn from the In-Person Events Boom

Looking for the latest digital trends? Good news: our Digital 2025 July Global Statshot Report has you covered.

Published in partnership between We Are Social and Meltwater, this latest update in our ongoing Global Digital Report series has all the data you need to understand evolving digital preferences and behaviours, including rich insights into:

Top stories in this quarter’s report include:

A deep dive into the disruption of search

The world’s “top” social media platform

A big new milestone for internet connection speeds

…and that’s just a fraction of what you’ll find in the 540+ pages of the full report, so be sure to read on below to get the full story.

As always, we’d like to start by extending our heartfelt thanks to our generous data partners, who provide the world leading data you’ll find in this report:

All of this analysis has been written by Simon Kemp, without the use of generative AI [why does this matter?]. 

Simon has been producing the Global Digital Reports series for 15 years, so he’s intimately familiar with the global “state of digital”, and how people’s online behaviours are evolving.

If you’d like to follow Simon’s regular analysis, you can connect with him on LinkedIn.

As you explore this latest report – and especially as you compare trends in the data over time – please be aware of the following notes:

With the generous support of GWI, we’re delighted to bring you expanded insights into the use of the world’s top social media platforms in this quarter’s report. These charts provide valuable new perspectives on social media use, and enable readers to develop an even more detailed understanding of digital preferences and behaviours. Please pay careful attention to the descriptions on each chart to understand what it portrays, and be sure to check the footnotes to identify the relevant data source(s).

GWI has expanded its coverage of audiences aged 65+ to a range of new countries, which may impact various metrics across its research. Please keep this expansion in mind when comparing the latest GWI values with figures published in our previous reports.

Please also refer to our comprehensive notes on data to learn about other recent changes.

You’ll find our complete Digital 2025 July Global Statshot Report in the embed below (click here if that’s not working for you), but read on past that to find an in-depth analysis of what all these numbers actually mean for you and your work.

Let’s begin with our usual look at the latest global headlines:

The United Nations’s World Populations Prospects data shows that there are 8.23 billion people living on Earth today, with that figure up by 70 million people (+0.9 percent) since this time last year. The UN’s data also highlights the continuing trend of urbanisation, with 58.3 percent of the world’s population now living in urban centres.

Analysis from GSMA Intelligence indicates that there are 5.76 billion unique mobile users around the world in July 2025, which equates to 70.0 percent of the world’s total population. The global unique subscriber figure has increased by 111 million over the 12 months, delivering annual growth of 2.0 percent. Meanwhile, data from Ericsson shows that smartphones now account for roughly 87 percent of the mobile handsets in use.

At the start of July 2025, the world’s online population had reached 5.65 billion, suggesting that internet penetration now sits at 68.7 percent. Internet user numbers have increased by 146 million (+2.7 percent) over the past year, but 2.58 billion people remain offline at the time of writing.

Kepios analysis indicates that global social media user identities now stand at 5.41 billion, with that figure equivalent to 65.7 percent of the global population. That user figure has increased by 4.7 percent over the past 12 months too, with 241 million new identities starting to use social platforms since July 2024 [note that “user identities” may not represent unique human individuals].

These headline figures offer a valuable overview of the global “state of digital” in July 2025, but in order to understand what people are actually doing online – and how their behaviours are evolving – we need to go deeper into the data.

So, go grab some refreshments, get yourself comfy, and we’ll take a closer look at this quarter’s essential findings.

Over the past two decades, search engines like Google, Bing, and DuckDuckGo have been the starting point for most people’s online activities and purchase journeys.

That’s still largely true today too, but online search behaviours and experiences are changing rapidly, and the impact of these changes will impact everybody who uses the internet – individuals and organisations alike.

So, given the critical importance of these trends, we’ll begin this quarter’s analysis with a deep dive into the changing face of search.

More than 4 in 5 online adults report using online search on a regular basis, with 80.6 percent of respondents in GWI’s latest survey stating that they’ve visited a search engine or web portal within the past month.

This figure ranks search engines third in GWI’s list of the world’s most popular online “properties”, behind messaging apps and social networks.

However, actual use of search engines may be even higher than GWI’s research suggests, because – even if the visit isn’t intentional – many web browsers automatically direct users to search engine results if they enter an incomplete, incorrect, or invalid URL in the address bar.

Indeed, this is likely the primary reason why “Google” remains the top keyword entered into Google’s own search engine.

For broader context, Similarweb reports that Google.com attracted an average of 83 billion visits per month between 01 March and 31 May 2025, from an average of 3.16 billion unique visitors each month.

Now those numbers are already pretty impressive, but other figures paint an even clearer picture of just how important Google has become to the world’s online activities.

For example, Similarweb reports that Google.com accounts for almost 20 percent of traffic to the world’s top 10,000 web domains.

Moreover, figures published by Semrush indicate that Google’s traffic may be even higher than Similarweb’s numbers suggest, with Semrush reporting an average of 105 billion visits per month to Google.com, from an average of 5.87 billion unique devices.

And furthermore, the available data suggests that Google handles trillions of searches every year.

But these figures aren’t really surprising, even if they’re still impressive.

Indeed, across the world’s 5.64 billion internet users, “finding information” remains a top motivation for going online, and more than 6 in 10 connected adults (61.3 percent) say that this is one of the primary reasons why they use the internet today.

 And we also see remarkable consistency in the use of search engines across demographics.

Retirees are the most likely to tell GWI that they’ve used a search engine in the past month, but GWI currently only polls respondents in this age group across a subset of its survey geographies.

Critically, that subset does not include India or China, where respondents are less likely to say that they use search engines overall.

And if we focus our attention on internet users aged 16 to 64, it becomes clear that there’s actually very little variation by age or gender when it comes to the regular use of search engines.

But this level of demographic consistency is actually highly unusual when it comes to digital behaviours.

For instance, even when it comes to other “ubiquitous” digital behaviours like the use of social media or email, we still see wider variation in the data across ages and genders for these activities than we see in the data for the use of search engines.

Consequently, this level of consistency may indicate that the use of search engines has become something of an inherent online behaviour.

However, GWI’s data suggests that the world’s use of search engines has been declining over recent months.

Four years ago, at the start of 2021, GWI’s survey found that 84.1 percent of online adults had used a search engine within the past month.

However, at the start of 2025, that figure has fallen to 80.6 percent, suggesting that search engines may be losing their coveted position as the starting point of online journeys.

It’s important to highlight that the use of search engines has fluctuated in the interim though, and we actually saw a steady increase in use between Q4 2022 and Q3 2024.

However, the latest figure of 80.6 percent is the lowest for the use of search engines that we’ve seen in GWI’s regular survey.

For context, recent trends may be symptomatic of shorter-term influences such as the news cycle, seasonality, or other “outside” factors, and this data alone does not indicate that search might be “dying”.

Moreover, the number of people saying that they use search engines has fallen by less than two percentage points compared with the recent high of 82.4 percent that we saw in Q2 2024.

But GWI’s survey isn’t the only source that points to a decline in search activity.

Despite the impressive numbers that we saw earlier, traffic to search engines has also been declining over recent years.

Analysis from Similarweb indicates that traffic to Google.com has fallen from roughly 19.8 billion visits per week this time three years ago, to 19 billion visits per week at the end of June 2025.

Admittedly, that’s not exactly a precipitous drop, but it still reveals a four percent decline in Google’s visitor traffic over the past 36 months, which in turn points to the loss of more than a billion searches per week.

Google isn’t the only search engine of course, but it is still the world’s favourite search platform, and analysis from Statcounter indicates that Google delivered almost 9 in 10 search engine referrals in May 2025.

Microsoft’s Bing is the world’s second most popular search engine, attracting more than 1.4 billion visits in May 2025, and accounting for roughly 4 percent of global search referrals that same month.

And interestingly, Similarweb’s data shows that Bing enjoyed impressive growth in visitor traffic between June 2022 and January 2025, with average weekly visits increasing by more than 40 percent during that time.

Everything you need to know about the global state of digital in July 2025

Digital 2025 July Global Statshot Report

If you’re a reality show lover who wasn’t watching Love Island USA this summer, you may have felt a little out of the loop. In the pop culture world, it seems like everyone has been watching the American version of this dating reality show, which started in the UK, currently in its seventh season. The premise brings single people together to couple up and try to win a $100,000 prize. 

Having aired every single day except Wednesdays from June 3 to July 13 on Peacock, the show has generated significant online discourse, spawning a number of viral memes. Plus, Peacock reports that Love Island is its “most-watched entertainment series on mobile devices, with nearly 30% of viewership happening on phones and tablets.”

With such a large mobile-first audience, it’s no wonder that Love Island has also been a boon to brands, both official partners and not, looking to tap into the zeitgeist and engage with heavily online consumers. We used our social listening and influencer marketing solutions to get the data behind the booming discussion and see which brands successfully rode the Love Island wave.

Dive deeper into the trends shaping the streaming industry in our Consumer Insights: Video Streaming Market report.

How big was the online buzz around Love Island USA season 7?

Mentions of Love Island from June 3 to July 13, 2025, on 17 social media channels including X, Reddit, Bluesky, Snapchat, and Pinterest

First, let’s start with some perspective. Remember the NBA Finals? From Game 1 to Game 7, the Finals generated about 2.51 million social media mentions. In those same weeks, Love Island generated about 4.39 million mentions on social media. 

Over the entire course of Love Island season seven, from June 3 to July 13, the show racked up nearly 13 million social media mentions in total. These are bigger-than-Labubu volumes. And interestingly, the Love Island discussion didn’t peak with the finale. Instead, the biggest night of show-related buzz was July 1 with the airing of a particularly drama-filled episode 26, during which contestants received anonymous letters from one another filled with grievances and criticism. Around 9pm central time, just as episode 26 ended, online discussion spiked to about 180,000 mentions (a 10x increase from the day before) as viewers processed, debated, and analyzed what had just unfolded. 

Love Island official partnerships and the Duolingo campaign

Love Island had integrated brand partners — including Cerave, Maybelline New York, and Coffee-Mate — whose products were featured in the show. Plus, it partnered with brands like Jose Cuervo, Instacart, Pepsi Wild Cherry, and TheraBreathe to create commercials starring the contestants.

Perhaps most surprising was the show’s social media activation with Duolingo. Instead of featuring the brand’s app, the posts feature its mascot Duo (whom the brand “killed” earlier this year) as a contestant on the show with the help of some creative video editing. 

Our influencer marketing analysis found that Duolingo’s six Love Island Instagram posts reached an estimated 8.9 million social media users and generated about 124,000 engagement actions.

The brand’s unconventional, story- and humor-driven approach paid off. Our analysis of the campaign within our influencer marketing solution found that Duolingo’s six Love Island Instagram posts (published just before and in the first week of season seven) generated about $400,700 in Estimated Media Value (EMV). 

How brands joined the Love Island conversation

Beyond official partnerships, many brands engaged with the thriving Love Island conversation by offering their own takes on the memes and trends that popped along the way. Here are just some of the many successful examples.

One of the most-memed moments of Love Island USA came on episode 12 when one contestant, Huda, reveals to another, Nic, that she has a daughter. The conversation, in which Huda says “I’m a mommy” to a misunderstanding Nic, who replies “Mamacita” and “Mommy?”, went viral online. Urban Outfitters took the meme for a spin to promote the also viral Micro Hydro Flask available at its stores. The clever take on the format generated more than 14,300 likes and about $19,700 in EMV.

That “I’m a mommy” meme we just talked about? It was a big one! Scrub Daddy’s video take featuring audio from the show has gotten more than 29,000 likes, achieving an impressive 4.37% engagement rate and over $41,200 in EMV.

Reality dating shows are often thought to have overwhelmingly female viewership, but Love Island has gotten attention for revealing the cracks in those assumptions. The NFL’s Los Angeles Chargers highlighted the overlap in their audiences in one popular Instagram post in which players shared their opinions about the show. It generated about $18,000 in EMV.

Its namesake holiday is months away, but Spirit Halloween used the “dream date” meme that originated from Love Island USA episode 13 to stay in the conversation. Its version of the viral screenshot format generated over 37,000 likes, a 3.12% engagement rate, and about $44,800 in EMV.

Learn more about hopping onto viral trends in our Ultimate Guide to Trendjacking.

This summer, Love Island USA did more than just dominate streaming, it took over social media and the internet at large. The brands that took notice in time to leverage the moment were those attuned to their audience’s interests, even when they crept beyond their traditional realms, as with the Los Angeles Chargers and Spirit Halloween.  

While official partners like Duolingo got in on the ground floor with the hit season, many others captured significant engagement by following the discussion in real time. Let this be a lesson to marketers everywhere: Brands don’t necessarily need formal partnerships to make a splash with trending topics and content if they have an agile, culturally intelligent and aware social strategy. 

How Love Island USA Was a Marketing Goldmine for Brands in Summer 2025

It’s summer in the Northern Hemisphere, so you know what that means. Time to get a cold drink, put on some sunscreen, and determine the song of the summer for 2025! Like last year, we used our social listening and analytics solution to dive into the online conversation about this season’s hottest songs. We used the top 10 tracks from the Billboard Songs of the Summer chart as it stood at Week 5 ending on July 7, 2025, as the basis of our comparison. Read on for definitive data on which song has gotten the most people talking (and typing) so far this summer.

What is the top song of the summer for 2025 according to social media buzz?

Social media mentions from June 1 to July 7, 2025 of the top 10 songs from Billboard’s Songs of the Summer chart as of week 5, ending on July 7, 2025.

The Meltwater Blog

What Marketers Can Learn from the In-Person Events Boom

Digital 2025 July Global Statshot Report

How Love Island USA Was a Marketing Goldmine for Brands in Summer 2025

The Song of the Summer 2025 Based on Online Buzz

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