Let’s review: what’s a tagline?

• An enduring catchphrase/slogan that positions the company and/or product
• It distills and captures the essence of the brand and/or product
• It should be able to stand alone
• It can also be used together with visuals
• Taglines are purely verbal/text

Nike’s tagline is the most famous of all time.

Here are a few other memorable taglines.

 

 

 

 

Have you ever noticed how short taglines are? Two to three words on average. That’s on purpose. Remember, I said that a tagline should distill the brand or campaign essence. Distill means to boil down to its essence. So when you’re writing taglines, keep the following rules in mind for keeping it as short and impactful as possible.

The Houdini Method as applied to Taglines

In his book, The Houdini Solution: Put Creativity and Innovation to Work by Thinking Inside the Box, Ernie Schenck quotes Michelangelo who said “Art lives on constraint and dies of freedom”.  Schenck uses Harry Houdini, the greatest escape artist of all time, to demonstrate the importance of embracing the straitjacket – literally and metaphorically.

He uses this example to illustrate the point.

Bound and locked in chains, Houdini was about to be lowered upside down into a glass box filled with six hundred gallons of water. He would have minutes to escape. Or die. Schenck asks: “What you be thinking if you were hanging there, if you were Houdini. Would you have focused all of your emotional energy on the hopelessness of the situation and quite possibly none of it on finding a solution? If you were faced with drowning, I think the box would have had you paralyzed with fear… But Houdini had a different approach. Instead, he accepted his circumstances. He accepted the box. He accepted the water inside the box. He accepted the chains and the locks. Rather than allowing his mind to be consumed with the problem, he directed all of his energy toward solving it.”

This is what Schenck calls the “Houdini Solution”. And it works especially well with taglines.

When it comes to taglines, the box is uncomfortably small. As in 2-3 words that capture and express the very essence of a brand. The best way to come up with a pithy, concise tagline? Embrace the constraints and focus all of your energy on the solution, not the problem. Think inside the box. As in the rules for coming up with taglines.

The #1 rule of taglines is a tagline must be three words or less. This is the gold standard.

• Just do it.
• I’m lovin’ it.
• Got milk.

But sometimes four words is OK.

• A diamond is forever
• It’s fingerlickin’ good
• It is. Are you?
• I think therefore IBM
• Because you’re worth it.

Occasionally, you’ll have a five word tagline that’s so great, it’s undeniable.

• Red Bull gives you wings.
• Do one thing. Do it well.

 

What else helps make a tagline good?

Rhyme

– Beanz Meanz Heinz

– Nothing sucks like Electrolux

– The quicker picker upper

 

Repetition

– Shave time, shave money

– The best 4x4xFar

– No fruit chew chews chewier

 

Question

– Can you hear me now?

– Who you gonna call?

 

Alliteration

– 99.9% need not apply

– P-P-Pick up a Penguin

– You’ll never put a better bit of butter on your knife

 

Assonance

– It beats as it sweeps as it cleans

 

Oxymoron

– The world’s local bank

 

Paraprosdokian

– Two for me, none for you

 

Anthimeria

– Think different

And about a thousand more rhetorical techniques. This stuff, proven over millennia, makes your writing stand out and ring true, and gives it a phonetic nature that sticks in peoples’ heads.

Onomatopoeia

– They’re GRRREAT!

– Once you pop, you can’t stop

– Schhh… you know who

 

Isocolon

– Be afraid. Be very afraid

– Grace. Space. Pace

– The few. The proud. The Marines

 

Anastrophe

– Impossible is nothing

 

How to write taglines

Those are types of taglines. But how do you come up with a great, short tagline that sticks in peoples’ minds and endures for decades? There are many methods you can try. Here’s one from Shlomo Genchin.

 

Step 1: Elaborate

After doing research, write everything that comes to mind about the brand.

“Tinder is an inclusive brand. If you want to meet new people, this app is for you, regardless of your age, origin, or sexual preferences. The company is based in the US, but millions of single (or not) people from all around the world use it every day. The concept is simple: you look at people’s photos and bio. Then you decide whether you like them by swiping left or right. If two people like each other, they’ll have a ‘match.’ After that, the exciting part begins, they start chatting, and sometimes, even meet in person and then…”

And so on.

✂️ Step 2: Eliminate

Choose between 10-15 words that matter most and scratch out the rest.

Tinder is an inclusive brand. If you want to meet new people, this app is for you, regardless of your age, origin, or sexual preferences. The company is based in the US, but millions of single (or not) people from all around the world use it every day. The concept is simple: you look at people’s photos and bio. Then you decide whether you like them by swiping left or right. If two people like each other, they’ll have a ‘match.’ After that, the exciting part begins, they start chatting, and sometimes, even meet in person and then…

 

🎲 Step 3: Play

 

Use these words to make different combinations until you get a tagline you like.

Word bank

Single, people, world, every day, simple, like, swiping, match, chatting, meet, person, exciting.

 

🎲 Step 3: Keep playing – combine the words

Possible taglines

– Swipe. Match. Meet.

– Single is Simple.

– Exciting Every Day.

– Simply Swipe. Simply meet.

– For Every Single Person.

– People swipe. People match.

– Swipe the world.

– Swiping is exciting.

– Chat to meet people like me.

– Not so single.

 

🎲 Step 3: Play

Schlomo’s fave because it’s inclusive and speaks to the target audience.

 

Try this out on your own. Use it to come up with potential headlines for Poo-Pourri.

Don’t like this method for writing tagliens? A quick google search reveals there are plenty of others.

Hashtags

As we just discussed, taglines are an important component of copywriting. They can help strengthen consumer connections and brand loyalty. But today not every brand uses them. You know what almost every brand on the planet uses instead? Hashtags.

Many hashtags are simply taglines with # in front of them. Like taglines, great hashtags distill the brand message and can be used to attract like-minded communities and promote communication with and between consumers. But hashtags are different from taglines in a few ways, which we’ll discuss soon. In the meantime, here’s a list of some of the best (as in most effective) Brand hashtags:

#ShareACoke (Coca Cola)

#LikeAGirl (Always)

#IceBucketChallenge (ALS Association)

#PutACanOnIt (Red Bull)

#CaughtOnDropCam (Nest)

#TweetFromTheSeat (Charmin)

#DigiornoOrYouDidnt (DiGiorno Pizza)

#MyCalvins (Calvin Klein)

What can hashtags do that taglines don’t? First and foremost, they make your campaign/content discoverable. Think of them as key words on steroids. Give it a try: type a hashtag into any social media platform and you’ll see an aggregated list of everything under the sun associated with that hashtag. Another unique thing hashtags can do is unify, inform and help move a group of like-minded people to act. They can be galvanizing. Taglines that are good examples include: #ArabSpring, #BlackLivesMatter #OptOutside.

Taglines are expected to remain unchanged for years and even decades. Few hashtags are as enduring. Most of them are meant to draw attention and inspire action in the moment. #Pinknic #boycottTarget #newjeans #renewwillow #WhopperDetour. One huge advantage of hashtags is that they’re because they’re clickable and searchable, they’re trackable and measureable.

A few hashtag ProTips to keep in mind:

Shorter is better. Don’t create hashtags that #stringtoomanywordstogether. Instead, #keepitsimple.

Don’t use too many hashtags. One hashtag is better than three. It’s easier to track and easier for consumers to associate with the campaign, product/service, and brand. But if you MUST have multiple hashtags, try to unify them by using the same word as a root. For example: #lovinit #lovinmccafe #lovinwifries #lovinmcmuffin