Finding a Slogan That Works For Your Business

Taglines and slogans are used to further identify your company and its place in the market. A logo creates an identity, and a slogan or tagline further defines that identity. A tagline should answer a few questions about your products and services before potential customers ever get a chance to ask. A slogan should be illustrative of why a customer should choose you and not your competition.

Brainstorming a slogan or tagline is something that should be done with the basic identity of your business growth strategy in mind. You should keep in mind the attitude you want your business to portray, whether its stodgy reliability, professional detachment, or wacky creativity.

Here are some tips for slogan development:

1) A slogan should be memorable without drawing too much attention to itself. It should be a strong statement that embodies the business, and one that people will recall when they see your logo or business name.

2) The content of a slogan should relate in some way to the nature of the business and the company name itself. In other words, if you are running a computer repair business, the slogan should mention something about computers, repair, or technical expertise.

3) You may want to be sure that each of the words you choose to use in the slogan has a positive connotation. Making people feel good about your brand is absolutely necessary, and negative connotations - even subtle or subconscious connotations - can detract from this.
4) Your slogan should reflect the attitude of your company. It should be funny or fun if that's what the company's image is.

5) Make sure that the slogan is original and doesn't interfere with existing trademarked slogans or taglines. This might be a difficult task, as you might have to do a trademark search to clear up any possible infringements.

6) The slogan should have marketability. That is, when you embark on an advertising campaign, you should be able to deploy it in print ads and other media.

7) Keep the slogan simple. A short, concise slogan will be far more memorable that will a long slogan. It's better to remain a little ambiguous with a short slogan than to clarify what you do and why your company is better with a long and rambling slogan that no one will remember.

8) Your slogan should be believable. A good example of this is a particular sandwich chain's slogan which is "The World's Greatest Gourmet Sandwiches." While legally this is acceptable because it's an opinion, it is such a broad and sweeping statement that it sets up the sandwiches for failure. In fact, most people would agree that the sandwiches are adequate, not spectacular - and so the slogan is revealed as a transparent marketing ploy that insults the reader.

Most of these corporate slogans are actually meaningless when you analyze them. Take, for instance, the all-too-common slogan "Where people make the difference." Well, you might say, yes. People make the difference. As opposed to intelligent machines or dolphins. Of course people make the difference. What people and what difference, however, is an area for speculation.

When designing your tagline or slogan, be sure to focus on the inferred meaning of the words and their meaning in context rather than individual definitions. Make sure that several people agree that it's effective before you deploy it for use in letterhead, stationary, or your website. Test your slogan on strangers, rather than friends and relatives – your friends will want to “spare your feelings” and won’t tell you that your slogan idea is lousy.

Your slogan is just one more aspect of what a potential customer or client may base their decision on when evaluating who to hire. You always want to put your best face forward and business growth and success will be soon to follow.