Marketing Buzzwords 'Influencer,' 'Impression' and 'On-Brand' Added to Merriam-Webster Dictionary

The Merriam-Webster dictionary has been in regular publication for 172 years, but the words and definitions added this year are rooted firmly in the 21st century.

According to AdWeek, several terms relevant to franchise marketing were recently deemed official English language words by the publication—including influencer, now defined secondarily as “A person who is able to generate interest in something (such as a consumer product) by posting about it on social media.”

The dictionary now includes on-brand, defined as “appropriate to, typical of, consistent with, or supportive of a particular brand,” and added a new eighth definition to impression: “Page view, especially: an instance in which a specific element (such as an advertisement) is displayed on a web page accessed by a user.” Additional business jargon buzzy, tweetstorm and gig economy were also added.

“Marketing and branding are fields that are now better understood and studied than ever before, and awareness of the terms used in the profession goes along with awareness of visual imagery and messaging for informed readers,” AdWeek quotes Merriam-Webster editor at large Peter Sokolowski. “All of us are consumers, even if all we are consuming is information.”