The Science of Slogans: The Best and Worst Ad Campaigns of All Time

"Good to the last drop." "Breakfast of champions." Some slogans last forever. Others don't last a year. How come?

What's in a slogan? One part elegant phrasing, two parts brand positioning, and a glaze of virtue and idealism. Oh, and don't forget a pinch of good luck.

SITEMASON

The year was 1907, and legend has it that President Theodore Roosevelt had just finished a cup of coffee at the Hermitage, the Nashville home of President Andrew Jackson, when he declared it "good to the last drop." Ten years later, the folks who brewed the cup, a company called Maxwell House, made the former president's coinage their official slogan. Some 90 years later, it still is.

Like diamonds, great slogans last forever. (As a matter of fact, De Beers' rock solid "a diamond is forever" line is 64 years old.) Still, some of the most popular brands change their slogans annually. Forget nine decades. In the last nine years, Dr. Pepper has experimented with a dozen slogans around the world.

Here are some of the most enduring (and the most constantly changing) slogans in American business in a gallery prepared by editors at The Atlantic.

SLOGANS THROUGH HISTORY

NIKE

"Just do it" (1993-present) "According to Nike company lore, one of the most famous and easily recognized slogans in advertising history was coined at a 1988 meeting of Nike’s ad agency Wieden and Kennedy and a group of Nike employees. Dan Weiden, speaking admiringly of Nike’s can-do attitude, reportedly said, 'You Nike guys, you just do it.' The rest, as they say, is (advertising) history." --via Center for Applied Research (WikimediaCommons)

MILK

"Got milk?" (1993-present) Created for the California Milk Processor Board in 1993, "Got milk" is perhaps the most recognizable and parodied commodity brand slogan in history. It is, as matter of scientific fact, impossible to have grown up in the 1990s, when the ads reached their peak frequency, to not have recreated, or watched friends recreate, the slogan in a school cafeteria, at least once a week.

AVIS

“We try harder” (1962-present) Talk about embracing the underdog within. In the 1960s, Avis was firmly behind Hertz as the number two rental company in the country. So they just ... acknowledged it. A 1964 Time magazine article recounts the creation myth this way: Robert C. Townsend, the president of Avis, Inc., was talking with his ad agency about Hertz's dominance. Avis had older cars, fewer rental locations, and similar rates. Why would anybody go to Avis? "Well," said Townsend, thinking for a moment, "we try harder."In the next two years, rentals soared by 30 percent, and the company hasn't changed its three-word identity since. (Bidgee/flickr)

Date: 2015-12-17; view: 1451