A good slogan says more than a thousand words
A slogan, also called a pay-off or slogan, is a pointed or distilled promise of what a brand or product can do for the customer. Or whatever your brand would like to be associated with. It can specify and position. When a slogan works best, it consists of a few words or a phrase that attracts attention and at the same time is easy to remember. It can often be a message that works particularly well with - or contains - the company or product name. For example, "Ali coffee cures gruff". There are also examples of slogans that stand on their own to such an extent that the logo and company name can be removed without removing what you want to convey, but this presupposes that the name and slogan are sufficiently incorporated together. If you say "Just do it", you do not need the name Nike to achieve the desired impression.
Who is behind pay-offs like these?
Do you know which products, companies or other things belong or have belonged together with the slogans below? And how many can you guess? (You can find the answers further down in the text. PS. Watch out for trick questions).
A little piece of Norway.
New growth for Norway.
We make Norway cheaper.
The sound of Norway.
Without governance, Norway will end up in the ditch.
Don't leave home without it.
Refreshes the parts other beers can't reach.
A little more expensive, for the taste.
City and country, hand in hand.
The best a man can get.
Advancement through technology.
It's not tough to be dead.
A slogan does not arise in a vacuum.
It could be tempting to try and find out what are the best slogans of all time, but then it becomes a poll based on pure perception because it is not so easy to measure to what extent one slogan works in relation to others. For what do we mean by working? That it should be remembered by most? Sell the most? Create the most attention or controversy? And how do you compare apples and lawyers? How do you set the slogan of a small soft drink producer in Western Norway against something that is part of a hundred million million campaign from The Coca-Cola Company? Also, the way these carefully selected words are placed in relation to the logo, the other visual expression and the campaigns that run, of course, helps to influence our perception of the slogan.
That said, there is still good reason to mention some factors that can help create an excellent slogan:
That it's easy to remember it all at once
That it is easy to link it to the product or company it mentions
That it highlights the most important benefit of the product, service or company
That it makes your brand stand out from the competition
That it gives the recipients, and at least the target group, a positive attitude towards the brand
That it creates pride internally and is something many people will associate with
An important choice
In politics, a good slogan can be directly decisive for the outcome of an election. In an arena where a few votes to the right or left can be the tip of the scale, it is clear that the most accurate platform statement can do tiny wonders (or great damage, seen from the opponents' perspective) for a candidate.
If we take the slogans Change we can believe in and Yes we can in combination with the modern design expression, this package undoubtedly helped to build the presidential candidate, and eventually the president, Barack Obama.
In 1979, Margaret Thatcher and the Conservative party collaborated with advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi in connection with the British election. Although the classic phrase was primarily part of an advertising campaign, the words "Labour isn't working" and an image of a long queue of unemployed people probably contributed to The Iron Lady winning the election at that time.
In the US, this year's election was between the man behind the big and recycled words MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN and the woman behind the claim STRONGER TOGETHER, and we woke up to shocking American election results. How much can be attributed to their sharp wording is hard to say, but the Guardian ran the following article: " Make America Great Again - why are liberals losing the war of soundbites?". It speculates that both Trump and Brexit won because of their slogans and the rhetoric surrounding them. When it is the case that four well-chosen words can make a male chauvinist billionaire and racist reality star president, it is clear that it is smart to weigh one's words - and slogans - in gold. By the way, it would not surprise me much if Trump is one of the few who actually owns a real gold scale.
Let's take some personal favorites
The aforementioned Just do it is high on most lists of good slogans, including my own. Google's Do Not Be Evil is so surprising and disarming that it's both refreshing and frightening when it comes to a Big Brother who really sees you. It is only to be hoped that they have no real desire to be evil. When the little bubble to Volkswagen came with its slogan Think small and the accompanying advertising text It makes your house look bigger, it broke with all the rules for what one could get oneself to say when everyone else was concerned with being the biggest and best. Impossible is nothing à la Adidas is also a very good slogan, regardless of whether it was Muhammed Ali or Adidas who said it first. One of the longest and most concrete slogans has a clear product advantage to offer; namely M & M's: The milk chocolate that melts in your mouth, not in your hand . There was also a very talkative Norwegian slogan that worked - for Solo: Probably the only soda that does not help other than thirst. Evergoods A little more expensive, for the sake of taste and Audi's Vorsprung durch Technik, which was also written in German in countries such as Norway and England, are examples of companies that are not "shadow scared". The way Apple used its slogan Think different is also an example to follow.
Correction: These examples are NOT to be followed, because as soon as you just copy others, it is often the others you are marketing - and not yourself.
Answer the test: Who said what?
A little piece of Norway. Freia's milk chocolate
New growth for Norway. The Labour Party, 1985
We make Norway cheaper. RIMI
The sound of Norway. P4
Without governance, Norway will end up in the ditch. The Labour Party, 1989
Don't leave home without it. American Express
Refreshes the parts other beers can't reach. Heineken
A little more expensive, for the taste. Evergood coffee
City and country hand in hand. The Labour Party, 1933
The best a man can get. Gillette
Advancement through technology. Audi
It's not tough to be dead. Safe Traffic
Comment
You probably managed to remember some of these slogans, but I wondered with as many as three of the Labor Party through the ages. Is it not fascinating that not only well-known city and country, hand in hand, but also The whole people at work came already in 1933? The two are probably among those who are best remembered by most to this day, eighty-three years after they were launched. Also by all of us who have not experienced the war. It's pretty impressive that they're still alive. No, it's not tough to be dead for a slogan either ...
NB! If you are wondering whether you should contact us at Mission regarding slogans, name development, changing company names , tone of voice or other things related to identity and branding, we say, strongly inspired by Nike: JUST DO IT!