The Almighty Tagline and Why Your Company Needs One
February 13th, 2008 Dina at Wordfeeder.comThe tagline is a short, one-liner that follows your company name and makes an emphatic, philosophical statement about your business. A good tagline captures the heart and soul of your company in a single, compelling sentence or phrase. It’s often a call to action (Nike: Just Do It) but it doesn’t have to be.
A tagline is conceptual in nature. It is the abbreviated version of your Company Philosophy or USP (Unique Selling Proposition). Your tagline should convey the greatest values embodied by your organization, or your reason for being.
Who doesn’t enjoy a snappy and clever tagline? Recall these famous taglines that have stayed with us for decades:
Campbell’s: Mmm, mmm, good!
GE: We Bring Good Things to Life.
Nobody Doesn’t Like Sara Lee.
AT&T: Reach Out and Touch Someone.
Have a Coke and a Smile.
Ideally, a tagline should not express the concrete or tangible, although you will come across many that do break this rule. Here’s an example of a poorly written tagline for a sports equipment store we’ll call The Clubhouse.
The Clubhouse: Superior Sports Equipment
Why is this a bad choice in taglines? Because it doesn’t leave room to grow. In five or ten years, this company may decide to expand their product line to include other items like sports videos, apparel, or even fitness gear. In which case, “sports equipment” would cover some, but not all, of their offerings. A tagline like this could easily misguide customers and turn new sales away at the door.
Many younger and less-evolved companies insist on using straightforward taglines like “Superior Sports Equipment” because they don’t fully understand the purpose of a tagline and have tunnel vision about their businesses. But there is a future workaround to this problem. Years from now, they can always make plans for rebranding after shifting their product line. They can create a new tagline and take steps to market it.
The drawback of this, of course, would be that it’s going to take some real work to familiarize and convert the audience to the new idea and ideal. Generally, a full-scale ad campaign is in order once you take on the challenge of rebranding. For small businesses, this can be taxing on both the marketing department and the budget.
And yet, companies who have been around for ages rebrand all the time. For these folks, having your name on the tip of everyone’s tongue is a luxury. It allows them to have some fun with their creative and gain even more visibility for their products and services in the process. But let’s not forget that even the most well-known brands had to start somewhere– and a tagline is the first step in crafting a small business with big-business potential.
Many people have a difficult time comprehending how a tagline that’s conceptual or philosophical could make viewers understand what their business is about. If you take a moment to consider the world’s most powerful brands, you’d likely find that the tagline is frequently esoteric in nature. Sometimes the company name is, too.
Imagine if you were someone who spent your entire life in seclusion, with no television, radio, internet or any type of media to influence your buying decisions or familiarize you with the commercial world. Would these names or taglines mean anything to you?
Chili’s: Pepper In Some Fun
Citibank: Let’s Get It Done
Got Milk?
Apple Computer: Think Different
UPS: What Can Brown Do for You?
Microsoft: Your Potential, Our Passion
If you’ve been living under a rock, then no, the above lines make no sense. But because society is so heavily influenced by what what we see and hear from the media, simple, catchy lines like this are by far the best shot a company has for converting you to their customer. Marketing “runs in the background” no matter where we are. Sometimes we tune in, but more often, we don’t. This is where the tagline comes in. You could have just “missed” the most captivating ad on the planet because you weren’t paying attention. But when you hear those few, familiar and memorable words making their final statement… you instantly know who the ad is from. Taglines are a proven memory trigger, and companies use them because they really work to build confidence in your brand.
If you think that a tagline isn’t necessary for your business, then you’re giving up an incredible opportunity to help people know your name with just a couple of well-placed words. Is a lifetime of sales worth the two hours of work that it takes to develop a solid tagline for your company? I would say it most definitely is.
Copyright 2008 Dina Giolitto, Wordfeeder.com Copywriting and Marketing. All rights reserved.
Need tagline support? 2 hours gets you a page and a half full of imaginative taglines tailored especially for your business. Email Dina@Wordfeeder.com and ask for your tagline job today.
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April 30th, 2008 at 8:22 pm
I’d love to learn that.
For example my business was a fitness gym whats the best tag line for it..
May 1st, 2008 at 2:33 pm
Hi Jake,
Thanks for visiting. I’d need to know much more about your business in order to be able to answer that. You’re inspiring me to create Part 2 of this article: How to Brainstorm Your Company Tagline… I’ll let you know when it goes live. :)
Dina