No "own branding"
Guest commentary The ongoing brand hysteria is mainly for self-promotion, says Dominik Imseng. And calls on his colleagues to show moderation.
Guest commentary The ongoing brand hysteria is mainly for self-promotion, says Dominik Imseng. And calls on his colleagues to show moderation.
Stylists currently have reason to frown. Roger de Weck, for example, wrote: "Neoliberalism, rarely has a brand been so strong and treacherous." The demand to control economic processes via the market wherever possible should therefore no longer be a philosophy. Nor a principle or concept. But a brand. The second example: Rudolf Augstein "launched an idea into the world in 1947 and allowed it to grow into a brand for over fifty years", according to Cordt Schnibben in an obituary of the Spiegel founder. For Schnibben, the fact that the Hamburg magazine became a brand is no less an achievement of the journalist of the century Augstein than the fact that he turned his magazine into the much-cited "assault gun of democracy".
Both quotes are telling. De Weck's fauxmot makes it clear how much the term "brand" has degenerated into a commonplace word. It's not just neoliberalism that is now supposed to be a brand. But also countries (like our own). Or cities (like his alleged "downtown"). And last year's German Advertising Congress had a special theme: "The human brand." Patron of the event: Wolfgang Thierse, President of the German Bundestag. Not a man to be harnessed to any zeitgeist cart.
The fact that he did it here anyway has to do with the sound, even the enamel, that the long-simple term "brand" has today, and to which Schnibben's basically less than honorable tribute to Augstein also owes itself. In fact, "brand" is a kind of magic word these days, a term of fascination. No wonder: brands are not only "sexy" - they are the "new gods", as Norbert Bolz and David Bosshart taught in their 1995 bestseller "Kultmarketing".
But is there really a form of brand awareness that can be called "cultic"? Isn't the assumption of a quasi-religious worship of brands merely an assumption?
a) a handful of ads that - like the PlayStation motif with the Lara Croft crucifix - make use of the creative spin "So good that we have nothing else on our minds", and
b) the tendency of young people to constantly come up with new recognition formulas: Sometimes something is "strong", then "cool", then "awesome", then "shrill" and currently "cult".
Despite such doubts, brands are stylized as "lighthouses" that are supposed to help us reduce the complexity of our society and even cope with our metaphysical homelessness. Among advertisers in particular, a new type is developing that is now making itself out to be a priest with the same zeal as it did as an artist in the 1980s.
This is all the more disturbing as advertising is one of the most important instruments of brand management. And should therefore contribute to its professionalization instead of further irrationalizing the discussion. Last but not least, in the interests of advertising itself: The last thing our industry, which is currently in one of its worst crises, needs is bad - if you'll pardon the term - "self-branding".
> Dominik Imseng is Creative Director at McCann-Erickson Switzerland.
Stylists currently have reason to frown. Roger de Weck, for example, wrote: "Neoliberalism, rarely has a brand been so strong and treacherous." The demand to control economic processes via the market wherever possible should therefore no longer be a philosophy. Nor a principle or concept. But a brand. The second example: Rudolf Augstein "launched an idea into the world in 1947 and allowed it to grow into a brand for over fifty years", according to Cordt Schnibben in an obituary of the Spiegel founder. For Schnibben, the fact that the Hamburg magazine became a brand is no less an achievement of the journalist of the century Augstein than the fact that he turned his magazine into the much-cited "assault gun of democracy".
Both quotes are telling. De Weck's fauxmot makes it clear how much the term "brand" has degenerated into a commonplace word. It's not just neoliberalism that is now supposed to be a brand. But also countries (like our own). Or cities (like his alleged "downtown"). And last year's German Advertising Congress had a special theme: "The human brand." Patron of the event: Wolfgang Thierse, President of the German Bundestag. Not a man to be harnessed to any zeitgeist cart.
The fact that he did it here anyway has to do with the sound, even the enamel, that the long-simple term "brand" has today, and to which Schnibben's basically less than honorable tribute to Augstein also owes itself. In fact, "brand" is a kind of magic word these days, a term of fascination. No wonder: brands are not only "sexy" - they are the "new gods", as Norbert Bolz and David Bosshart taught in their 1995 bestseller "Kultmarketing".
But is there really a form of brand awareness that can be called "cultic"? Isn't the assumption of a quasi-religious worship of brands merely an assumption?
a) a handful of ads that - like the PlayStation motif with the Lara Croft crucifix - make use of the creative spin "So good that we have nothing else on our minds", and
b) the tendency of young people to constantly come up with new recognition formulas: Sometimes something is "strong", then "cool", then "awesome", then "shrill" and currently "cult".
Despite such doubts, brands are stylized as "lighthouses" that are supposed to help us reduce the complexity of our society and even cope with our metaphysical homelessness. Among advertisers in particular, a new type is developing that is now making itself out to be a priest with the same zeal as it did as an artist in the 1980s.
This is all the more disturbing as advertising is one of the most important instruments of brand management. And should therefore contribute to its professionalization instead of further irrationalizing the discussion. Last but not least, in the interests of advertising itself: The last thing our industry, which is currently in one of its worst crises, needs is bad - if you'll pardon the term - "self-branding".
> Dominik Imseng is Creative Director at McCann-Erickson Switzerland.
