Branding your memory

A great feature on the BBC website looks at corporate slogans, those tags or straplines accompanying a corporate brand.

Some good examples from companies, principally in Europe, of the types of brand promise such slogans (hopefully) evocate and which arguably have been pretty effective over the years. At least, they all resonate with me:

  • Carlsberg: “Probably the best”
  • Tesco: “Every little helps”
  • O2: “See what you can do”
  • Honda: “The power of dreams”
  • McDonalds: “I’m lovin’ it”
  • John Lewis: “Never knowingly undersold”
  • British Army: “Be the best”
  • HSBC: “The world’s local bank”
  • L’Oreal: “Because you’re worth it”
  • Ronseal: “Does exactly what it says on the tin”

That last one, from Ronseal, has passed into common expression. I often hear someone using that slogan in reference to, say, a communication programme as a metaphor for what you expect it to achieve.

A couple of others I’d add:

  • Orange: “The future is bright”
  • Nokia: “Connecting people”

What are your favourites?

Neville Hobson

Social Strategist, Communicator, Writer, and Podcaster with a curiosity for tech and how people use it. Believer in an Internet for everyone. Early adopter (and leaver) and experimenter with social media. Occasional test pilot of shiny new objects. Avid tea drinker.

  1. Lauren Vargas

    Range Rover
    Ad slogan: Range Rover. It’s how the smooth take the rough.

    Volkswagen Beetle
    Advertising slogan: Think Small

    Dr. Pepper: Wouldn’t you like to be a pepper too?

  3. neville

    Thanks for that link, Pam. Some great slogans there, many of which are really enduring.

    Good ones, Lauren.

    One other that springs to mind, must be at least 20 years ago: “I liked the shaver so much, I bought the company.” That was for the Remington razor. Rather, by Victor Kiam for Remington. An example, too, of stamping a personality into the brand.

    A contemporay one: “The Axe effect” for Axe deodorant. How enduring will it be, though, I wonder.

  4. Jonathan

    the other night i saw an ad for Taco Bell and it seems their new slogan is “Be a fourthmealer.” I think that’s interesting because they seem to really be pushing their late night hours with this new slogan. As i was watching the ad i was thinking to myself that i would love to see where majority of their sales come from. Either they are doing really poor at lunch and dinner and therefore think the latenight snack idea is the best campaign to push. Or, their doing great business at lunch and dinner, but want to continue great sales late into the night so they decided to launch a campaign to let people know that their open until 1 a.m. or later. It’s an interesting ad either way.

  5. neville

    That’s another good example, Jonathan.

    Yet I wonder how enduring a slogan like that will be. If it’s part of a current ad campaign, then won’t there be a new slogan at some point?

  6. Lee's new Better Communication Results

    Memories, like the corners of my mind……

    Young master Neville Hobson has been thrashing the gears of my memory with a recent post of his. He was asking folks to share their favourite brand slogans (or promises) and he came up with a few that got my memory juices bubbling again… L’Oreal: …

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