Meryl's Notes Blog

I’m reading a book about Google Adwords (I’m not planning a campaign — it’s for an abstract I’m writing), which calls the ads “haikus” and I just read about “the haiku of branding” in reference to tourism slogans. Neither use the 5-7-5 syllables khaiku rule unless a Google ad just lucks out with 5-7-5. Just went to Google and ran a random search. Not one ad used 5-7-5.

Obviously, they’re using “haiku” to referencing the short ‘n sweet method of branding and advertising.

In a Dallas Morning News article [might require free registration], Eric Swartz, president of TaglineGuru.com, calls “I call sloganeering the haiku of branding. It compresses the meaning of a vision or a value.” I’d say a slogan (and tagline) is supposed to communicate value in a short statement. It doesn’t need another name. I’ve rarely, if ever, seen a lengthy slogan.

Besides, a slogan usually takes one line. Haikus have three. Weird association. Google Ads are the closest thing to a haiku minus the syllables since they have three lines and the URL. Scroll through the taglines on TaglineGuru.com and notice they’re all short. Click Tagline and Jingle Survey or City Branding Survey at the bottom for inspiration. How many do you recognize? They stick with you.

I’ve covered this in the past — on vision, mission, and statements.

Wikipedia defines slogan: “a memorable phrase used in a political or commercial context as a repetitive expression of an idea or purpose.”

And tagline: “a variant of an advertising slogan typically used in movie marketing, commercials, and websites. The idea behind the concept is to create a memorable phrase that will sum up the tone and premise of a film, or to reinforce the subject’s memory of a product or website.”

Let’s leave haiku out of marketing. It’s not cute. It’s not accurate. Slogans and taglines suit just fine.