Wir sind We

Trendbüro and slogans.de have updated their analysis of advertising
slogans from the German-speaking world. I blogged about last year's study here.

Interesting that only one of the trends has remained - Gemeinschaft, or "Feeling of Community". I'll come back to that later. As far as the others go, I guess that brands have taken a step down from idealism onto a lower but more realistic rung. Which is not a bad thing in the current climate.

So Exklusivität has become the more accessible Qualität, the rather idealistic Nachhaltigkeit (Sustainability) has moved to a more basic Leistung (Performance) and the theoretical, non-specific Orientation has outed itself as a clear direction: Optimismus. It seems that brands have to give a good specific account of themselves in the here-and-now to appeal to people today.

Going back to "Gemeinschaft". The experts at Trendbüro detect a broadening of the "Wir" feeling across borders to "We", suggesting a sort of Global Cuddlefest. They could be right, but I take a different angle. I am convinced that Mr Obama has succeeded in making English socially acceptable once more, after the rejection of the language by "Old Europe" a few years back. And I expect we'll see English slogans in German advertising gain ground once more. As long as Douglas don't go back to "Come in and find Out."