In our last post, we talked about the importance of giving your business the right name and our process for helping brands get there. Just as every superhero needs a trusted sidekick, every name needs a solid tagline to help do the work.
Taglines are a critical element of any brand platform, spreading brand awareness and value. A good tagline clearly communicates the brand message without specifically mentioning the product or service the company offers. (Think: “Just do it.”) It should be memorable. (“The happiest place on earth.”) And it should be succinct—typically no more than three to five words. (“Got milk?”)
Sound challenging? It can be. But it’s also a lot of fun! Here’s a peek into how we developed a tagline for Sierra Produce, the parent company of the SunLink product brand we recently developed.
Doing the groundwork
When developing a tagline, the first step is always bringing together the right people and getting them engaged in the process. This means talking with the client team about their brand messaging and key considerations, any initial ideas they’d like to explore, specific words or directions we should avoid, and so on. The idea is to get clear about the criteria and set up some guardrails, if needed.
We don’t always do the brand platform and tagline development in tandem, but the tagline is the most concise expression of the brand itself, so we like to! In this case, we developed core messaging for the Sierra Product brand first, so we were able to get right to work.
Initial exploration
In a tagline exploration we like to get our whole team involved to come up with 50-75 candidates covering a range of concept areas. One of the advantages of hiring a team of writers is that different minds go to different places with the same concepts—it’s always fun to see what everyone comes up with and we often riff off of each other’s ideas, too.
For this client, we explored a range of tagline concepts and constructs focusing on the brand’s key qualities of flavor, quality, and year-round availability. Our first round included options ranging from the more evocative, like The Perfect Pick, to more descriptive, Always the Best Fruit, or more playful, Deep Roots. Flavorful Fruits.
And the winner is…
As with the initial naming exploration, we always advise out clients to spend some time with the first round of candidates and let things sit for a few days before providing feedback and highlighting favorites. Sometimes, an option will open up a new area we can explore further in the second round. The more directive a client’s feedback is, the better—don’t just tell us which ideas you like, tell us why. And if something isn’t working for you, figure out exactly what it is that’s not sitting right. A specific word? An image? A connotation? Remember, it’s your brand so you know it best. We’re relying on your direction to guide our efforts.
This client was satisfied with the options we presented in the initial round, so we moved directly on to finalizing the tagline. The client team landed on Farm to Family Every Day, which does a good job of communicating both the freshness and year-round availability of their produce, as well as their commitment to their growers and customers. Alliteration and rhythm help to make the tagline more memorable.
If you have a brand in need of a tagline, or a tagline in need of help, drop us a line. We love helping brands distill their message with punchy, pithy taglines.
