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In describing the brand development process for a county in the United States, the city editor of The News-Dispatch effectively portrays how many destination-branding efforts so easily devolve into little more than an advertising slogan within the context of nothing:
LaPorte County’s new tourism slogan is “Destination Discovered.”
I don’t know how much the LaPorte County Convention & Visitors Bureau paid for that, but whatever the amount, it was too much.
Bland doesn’t even begin to describe it.
It sure isn’t “Virginia is for Lovers,” a slogan which has been around for 35 years and has set the standard for all others…
“Destination Discovered” looks and sounds like it was created by committee. I wasn’t involved in the thought process that created this gem, but I bet that with so many people involved, and everyone bending over backwards to show how everyone in LaPorte County is cooperating with each other, every ounce of creativity was sucked right out of the process…
Everything that is unique about LaPorte County was discarded for pablum…
County tourism officials say the “countywide brand” will “promote all aspects of economic development in LaPorte County” and will “enhance the concept of countywide unity and dedication to making LaPorte County a destination to be discovered and desired to visit and stay again and again.”
Fat chance.
Without process expertise, and a process discipline, branding by committee creates homogenized vapor.
Instead, to be successful brand creation is all about being different from every other tourism and economic development competitor. A brand tagline such as Destination Discovered articulates everything within the context of nothing — the tagline could authentically apply to ANY location throughout the world. As Destination Discovered describes Anywhere, The World, this brand tagline will easily become lost in the thousands of messages people hear each day; it will not rise above the white noise of contemporary culture. Any audience LaPorte County may wish to influence by this approach will remain unmoved, other than the misguided cheerleaders of the agencies involved, each of whom sat around a conference table and told each other how good they looked and how smart they were.
In branding alliteration, Destination Discovered is DOA. Sadly, an oft-repeated tale.
Paxson Communications recently announced the change of its television network brand from Pax TV to i.
Paxson’s hometown newspaper offers more of the backstory behind “i”:
Paxson Communications Corp. renamed its PAX-TV network with one letter — “i” — last week while realigning its mission as a provider of independently produced television.
But when it came to renaming its Web site, it needed to use seven letters.
West Palm Beach-based Paxson had to go with “ionline.tv” because other media companies are fond of the letter i, too.
For instance, the “i.tv” domain name is owned by iEntertainment Network Inc., a pay-per-play online gaming company based in Phoenix. And the “itv.com” site is owned by ITV Plc, the British independent television network.
“i-channel.com,” meanwhile, is part of Comcast Corp. subsidiary International Networks, which produces “multi-ethnic programming” in the United States.
But Paxson spokeswoman Leslie Monreal said her company’s “i” would not get mixed up in any alphabet soup.
“We distinguish it by the actual logo,” she said. “Our creative services department did a great job designing the i and also developing concepts around how to market the i.”
The fact that the new brand has already disappeared into the online tar pit filled with all the other iBrands to such an extent that the company is pinning all its hopes on the logo to bail them out betrays a great wealth of desperation. One of the “concepts around how to market the i” expected to shoulder this burden?
The i death-ray logo suggests further boardroom battles over the direction of the brand.
How often have we seen this: a rebrand attempt framed by a high (or in this case shockingly low) production value “solution”, presented in a conference room outside the context of how the target audience will hear it, see it, or experience it? Months later, the organization wonders why the sales needle did not move, or why the investment community lost interest.
In contrast to i, consider this noteworthy example of a television network pulling off a successful brand rehab.
Finet Group Limited, a Hong Kong based financial services company, announced adoption of a new corporate identity. The company’s press release quickly devolves into a labored explanation of the new identity to “reaffirm the company’s commitment to serving and bringing values to global Chinese through the provision of integrated financial services and information solutions.” And it continues in that vein:
The center point of the new identity is a new logo — the traditional Chinese character of China or ‘’hua'’ in calligraphy engraved on a sea green foundation, representing Finet’s relentless focus on inspiring connections with global Chinese communities. The Chinese calligraphy is the work of a veteran calligraphist who had inscribed Finet’s Chinese name in the previous logo; his graceful yet forceful brushes unleash a sense of balance and dynamism that has been embodied in Finet’s culture to achieve long-term growth and success…
We propel the financial growth of institutions and individuals with our unique capacity to interconnect comprehensive financial information, advanced technologies and value-added services….
‘’The new identity recognizes Finet’s past and demonstrates its direction for the future…. Elements from the previous logo including our corporate color and the Chinese calligraphy have been retained to reinforce this advantageous position of Finet whereas a clean, powerful design successfully invigorated the whole corporate identity to better underscore our ambition to capture the sizable customer base of global Chinese, especially in the PRC market,'’ Dr. George Yu, Finet’s Chairman and CEO commented.
Finet’s CEO is a victim of insider-speak, along with another victim we recently chronicled, Ricoh.
Insider-speak is a language of relevance only to those inside a company, and will fail to engage the audience a company such as Finet seeks to influence and develop as customers.
Rather than sounding like most other financial information providers (”integrated financial services and information solutions” or “interconnect comprehensive information” or “value-added services”), Finet should instead focus on what it is they offer that eases a significant pain point of their target market, relevant and compelling to that same market, and 180 degrees opposite the direction of their competition. The result would be a uniquely differentiated brand, one full of emotional immediacy, and a demonstration of how to “propel…financial growth,” rather than the labored explanations of insider-speak.
With a uniquely differentiated brand would come competitive advantage for Dr. Yu and his company, driving revenues and margins. For capitalists in any culture, that’s a lot of emotional immediacy.
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