Great Slogans For Business

21/06/2011

Great slogans (and rubbish slogans)

By Jackie Barrie, Copywriter, Trainer & Author at Comms Plus

When Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic played tennis at the O2 in November 2010, there was a pause while Novak had a contact lens attended to on court. Some wag in the crowd shouted: "Should've gone to Specsavers" — five words that have proved very effective for the company.

It’s harder to write something short than something long. So, in this article, I’ve analysed a range of slogans and suggest the reasons why they work (or don’t).

Positive emotions

People buy because of how you make them feel, not because of...

...what you tell them. These examples all contain positive emotions:

- Terry's Chocolate Orange: "Smash it to pieces. Love it to bits."

- Recruitment agency: ‘Love Mondays.’ That's just it. They don't sell jobs. They sell happy Mondays.

- Head & Shoulders: 'Making heads happier.'

Anthropomorphising is a commonly used technique (that is, giving human qualities to something).

NLP in slogans

In Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) terms, people have a preference for Visual, Auditory or Kinaesthetic sensory inputs. That is to say, they like pictures, words or feelings.

- Canon: ‘Take more than pictures. Take stories.’ By combining a visual word 'pictures' with an auditory word 'stories', the slogan appeals to a wider audience.

- Lloyd Grossman sauces: 'Sauces with a distinctive voice'. It fits. And I like the fact that they have combined the sense of taste (a sauce) with the sense of hearing (voice).

Repetition in slogans

Repeat something three times, and maybe add a touch of innuendo. It sticks in the memory!

- Deep pan pizza: “Real deep. Real good. Real thing.”

- Martini: “Anytime, anyplace, anywhere.”

- Aldi: 'Great food, great prices, pass it on'. It has the benefit and a call to action. Like on Twitter, saying 'Please Retweet' (or 'Pls RT'), it results in more people... continued on page two >

 

 

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