How to Make a Political Meme in Under a Minute

A good political meme is one idea, one image and a handful of words. The hard part is the idea. Everything after that should take seconds, and with PolliesLOL it does. Here’s the whole process, start to finish.

1. Start with the point, not the picture

Before you open anything, decide what you’re poking at. A promise that hasn’t aged well. A Question Time answer that said a lot without saying anything. A policy with a very catchy name. Pick one target and one idea.

If it takes two sentences to explain the joke, you have two memes. Make the better one first.

2. Pick your pollie

In the meme creator, choose the politician your joke is about. A meme lands when the face and the caption belong together, so choose the person the line is actually aimed at, not whoever looks the funniest.

3. Choose a background

Pick a background that keeps white caption text easy to read. The blue, green and red options all work.

One practical note: those colours can accidentally read as party branding. If your joke isn’t about a particular party, think about which colour you’re choosing so the meme doesn’t suggest something you didn’t intend.

4. Write the caption

You get a heading and a subheading. The heading is the punch, the subheading is the twist.

• Keep the heading to about six words. If it wraps onto three lines, cut it.
• Put the setup in the heading and the payoff in the subheading, or the other way around, but never bury the joke in the middle.
• Read it aloud. If it takes longer than a couple of seconds, it’s too long.

A simple starting point: WHEN YOU PROMISE as the heading and NO NEW TAXES as the subheading. Everyone knows the format, and you only need to swap in your own words.

5. Download and share

Hit download and you’ll get a square image, ready for Facebook, group chats or anywhere else. Every meme carries a small PolliesLOL watermark so people can find the tool and make their own.

When you share it, add a line or two of your own in the post. A meme with a short comment on top tends to start more conversation than the image alone.

A few habits that help

• Aim at what people do in public, such as their votes, statements and policies. Keep their families and private lives out of it.
• Make one meme at a time. Posting a flurry of near-identical images dilutes all of them.
• Check the spelling. A typo in the caption becomes the joke, and not the one you intended.

Ready to try it? Make your first meme and see how fast it comes together.