Condom manufacturer Durex is calling on social media users? help to demand a safe sex emoji on the official messaging shorthand keyboard. 

The brand is attempting to get the hashtag #CondomEmoji trending on social networks, a venture to become part of younger demographics? conversations on mobile. Durex determined a need for condom-focused emojis to align its brand with younger, sexually active consumers following research which revealed that while these mobile users are discussing sex through emojis many are still unconcerned with safe sex practices.  

?Our goal is to create a global movement that encourages the Unicode Consortium to create the world?s first safe sex emojis by having 1 million people support our campaign using #CondomEmoji on their social channels," said Karen Chisholm, marketing director at Durex. "On December 1st, World AIDS Day, we will submit an official application to Unicode, with the statistics generated by this campaign to support the creation of the first condom emoji.?

Durex is hoping to become the fuel for a viral campaign calling for safe sex emojis. While a significantly large amount of mobile users are leveraging emojis to talk about sex, there is no emojis that represent a condom and the brand is hoping to change that.



A video is being shared on Durex's social pages that asks users to get in on the action and features a variety of consumers sharing different emojis talking about sex. The narrator calls for the need for a condom emoji. 

The condom brand is aiming to get more than one million social media users to share the hashtag #CondonEmoji and hopes to get the conversation trending on platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. The idea is to grab the attention of Unicode Consortium, which is responsible for the official emoji keyboards located natively on mobile devices. 

While numerous brands are developing their own keyboards, Durex chose to only introduce one un-branded emoji in the official keyboard, as it will be more widely accepted. Consumers who are highly loyal fans of brands will download branded keyboards, but this is a small market of users and the experience is not the same whereas the official keyboard is used by all. 

The research shows that more than one third of consumers aged 18 to 25 are not concerned with practicing safe sex along with almost 50 percent believing HIV will never affect them. Durex spawned the idea for a condom emoji when more than 84 percent of respondents claimed that discussing sex was much easier through the use of emojis.

Toyota also paired emojis with social media with a secret emoji innovation with a contest to band together sports team fans in a show of support (see more). 

Also, Ford recently launched a branded sticker keyboard through mobile messaging applications while GE developed science lessons incorporating emojis, amplifying the role of emoji-centric marketing tactics through creative and offbeat methods (see more). 

?The Durex brand wants to help empower young couples to overcome embarrassment and feel comfortable having honest discussions about safe sex," Ms. Chrisholm said. "By demonstrating a real need and global demand for safe sex emojis, we hope to bring condoms to the forefront of the conversation between young couples and give them the opportunity to discuss safe sex naturally.?