Products are getting better, services are becoming more convenient, and offerings are being tailored more precisely to different needs. At the same time, it’s becoming harder to develop something that’s truly new to people and makes a meaningful difference. This is, first and foremost, a challenge for product development.

But increasingly, it's also used for communication.

What else should we actually develop?

Anyone who has worked in product development long enough is familiar with this question: What else can we develop that’s truly new? Not just another flavor. Not the next additional feature. Not a minor improvement that, while measurable, is barely noticeable to customers.

Rather, something that makes people say, “That’s interesting. I’d like to try that.” Because the more mature products and markets become, the harder that gets.

Many basic needs have long since been addressed. Products have been improved, expanded, and diversified over the years. As a result, innovation often takes place in increasingly smaller steps.

And that's exactly where the problem with communication begins.

Make a difference with it …

After all—the expectation remains the same. Brands should stand out. Products should be distinctive. Campaigns should capture attention. Customers should be given a reason to take an interest in your offering rather than someone else’s. So communication is tasked with a challenging mission:

Make it something special.

This works well when there really is something special about a product. It becomes more difficult when the differences between products are becoming increasingly small, but at the same time, the differences highlighted in marketing communications need to be emphasized more.

Perhaps that is why it is not just communication that has become more interchangeable. Perhaps what communication is supposed to convey is also becoming increasingly interchangeable.

Good communication becomes a given

At the same time, the craft is changing. Professional copy, high-quality images, content tailored to specific audiences, personalization, and the ability to quickly create variations are becoming increasingly accessible. AI is further accelerating this trend. This is positive at first, as it leads to higher quality.

But if many companies are able to communicate professionally, professionalism will increasingly become a prerequisite rather than a distinguishing factor. Then the question “How can we make our communication even better?” will no longer suffice.

First, there would have to be another one: Do we even have anything that makes a real difference to people?

Ovomaltine Meets DAR-VIDA

An interesting example from Switzerland shows that it is not always necessary to invent something completely new to achieve this.

In 2025, two well-known brands were combined: Ovomaltine and DAR-VIDA. The result was DAR-VIDA Ovomaltine—whole-grain crackers combined with Ovomaltine chocolate. Not a new product category. Not a technological revolution. But a combination that had never existed before.

According to HUG, the co-branding campaign marked DAR-VIDA's most successful market launch to date and attracted numerous new customers. It is not clear from this information what role the product itself, the brand awareness of the two brands, or the marketing played in this success.

For our purposes, something else is key: There really was something new to share. The communication didn't have to invent the difference—the product brought it with it.

And perhaps this example illustrates something else as well: Innovation doesn't always have to mean inventing something completely new. Sometimes it's enough to combine familiar elements in a new way to create something that captures people's interest.

First the difference, then communication

Perhaps this sequence will become more important in the future. We’re taking a close look at how messages are formulated, personalized, tested, and optimized. That’s all well and good. But perhaps marketing and communications need to start one step earlier more often:

What exactly is the difference we want to convey?

A new achievement. A better experience. A surprising combination. A meaningful improvement. Something that truly matters to people. Because communication can highlight an existing difference, explain it, and make it interesting. But it cannot permanently replace it.

Therefore, there must be a difference before communication can make a difference.

Perhaps that is why one of the most important tasks of good communication in the future will not lie in communication itself, but rather in determining whether there is anything worth talking about in the first place.

By the way: Perhaps in the future, communication will fail less because it’s poorly executed and more because it’s supposed to convey a difference that doesn’t exist (anymore).

Laura Colledani and Klaus Ammon have more than 40 years of combined experience in consumer research and marketing research. Over the years, they have developed a keen sense of what moves people - even beyond the numbers. Both authors advocate a communication culture that listens before it broadcasts. With the new approach of consumer listening management tools, they want to support marketing managers in not only questioning consumers in the traditional way, but also entering into a genuine relationship with them.

The idea works.

81 percent of those surveyed like the ad. „Funny,“ „creative,“ „short and to the point,“ „cool and clever“—that’s how they spontaneously describe their impressions. Others specifically highlight the unusual „combination of people and nature.“ That said, not everyone likes the execution. Some would like more explanation, while others find the connection unfamiliar at first or think the commercial is too short.

That doesn’t have to be a disadvantage. Communication that aims to stand out can also be unsettling. What matters most is that the message gets across. 92 percent say that „Nature is our life. Let’s take care of it“ is clearly conveyed. At the same time, the ad sparks reflection, surprise, and empathy. Actually, we could be satisfied at this point. But—there’s still one interesting question hanging in the air …

From Understanding to Action

People can understand a message. They can agree with it. They can find it appealing and credible—and still do nothing. That sounds trite. But it isn't.

After all, a significant part of communication logic is based on the assumption that positive perceptions and approval will eventually translate into action. Even if that were the case—it’s not enough. The survey on the WWF campaign provides an interesting insight into this: when asked about a possible donation to the WWF, 43 percent remain undecided. Not against it—but not (yet) in favor of it either.

Maybe we're asking the wrong question

Normally, one might ask at this point:

• How can we make our communication even more persuasive?

Perhaps that isn't the crucial question at all. If a message is already understood, credible, and meets with approval, trying to be even more persuasive may be of only limited help. The more interesting question, therefore, is:

• What is missing in a person who is already convinced, so that their conviction will eventually lead to action?

This also changes the way we view communication. It’s not always about changing attitudes. Sometimes—as in the case of WWF’s communication—those attitudes are already in place. Then it becomes interesting to consider what gives existing attitudes enough weight in a specific situation that they lead to action. Or to put it another way: what prevents action from following?

What We Can Learn From This

Perhaps we sometimes overestimate the power of approval in marketing and communication.

„I like it.“
„I feel the same way.“
„It's important.“
„I support that.“

These are positive reactions. But they aren't actions. Between attitude and behavior lie personal experiences, habits, priorities, barriers, and specific situations. And possibly a trigger that suddenly gives a topic a different meaning.

The factors at play are likely to vary from person to person and from situation to situation. That is precisely why it is generally not enough to «just» know, what people think. We should understand better, when and why what they already think—or, rather, what they are convinced of—becomes relevant to their actions.

What does this mean for the WWF?

First of all: The communication works. It stands out, is understood, generates goodwill, and combines a serious message with an unusually lighthearted approach. The candid responses, in particular, show that the comparison between humans and nature really resonates. We can build on that.

The next step, therefore, should not automatically be to make the message even more emotional, even more compelling, or to explain even more. It would be far more interesting to find out what lies behind that big „…Maybe I’ll take action.“ Or to put it another way: Why do people who are generally positive about the cause remain undecided nonetheless?

Is there a lack of personal connection? Is the issue not urgent enough in everyday life? Is there a lack of a specific reason? Or does the general agreement simply compete with a hundred other things that seem more important at any given moment?

This survey does not provide answers to the questions above.

Perhaps the most challenging task of communication is not always to create new beliefs, but rather to understand why existing beliefs have no consequences.

By the way… People don't always need to be convinced—sometimes they're already convinced. The key question, then, is to figure out why they still aren't taking action.

Source: *1 deeptrue.com, July 9, 2026, representative survey of the population, German-speaking Switzerland.

Laura Colledani and Klaus Ammon have more than 40 years of combined experience in consumer research and marketing research. Over the years, they have developed a keen sense of what moves people - even beyond the numbers. Both authors advocate a communication culture that listens before it broadcasts. With the new approach of consumer listening management tools, they want to support marketing managers in not only questioning consumers in the traditional way, but also entering into a genuine relationship with them.

But that doesn't get to the heart of the matter at all. It's not about brevity per se; it's about making sure people don't get bored. So would length be okay if the content were entertaining and/or relevant? Of course! Seven-hour podcasts, overly long movies packed with explosions, and the Eurovision Song Contest all prove this—though this selection also highlights the problem: what people find entertaining is a matter of taste. For some, the thrill lies in hours of cage fights in front of the White House; for others, in a 90-minute, irrelevant soccer game that ends 0–0. Still others sit through operas twice as long, and yet others spend twice as long trying—in vain—to solve a crossword puzzle. And yes, the fact that length in and of itself isn’t necessarily a bad thing also applies to text. Harry Potter has around seven million characters (including spaces), and the never-ending series *The Three Exclamation Points* has reached 30 million characters so far (it probably includes plenty of exclamation points, too).

Make an offer!

And of all things, the caption for your Instagram post absolutely can’t be longer than 3.5 characters (including spaces), or else your target audience will be frustrated? Hmm, yeah, sorry—maybe that’s not the problem at all. Maybe the content is just too boring. Because people don’t stick around because it’s short, but because it’s awesome, exciting, enlightening, cool, beneficial, hilarious, or cute. Or because it’s about wizard students or young detectives. You probably can’t offer the latter, though. But for heaven’s sake: offer something!

And that’s exactly why this column will now appear in the print edition a little longer than before—but it will still be on page 7 as usual.

My thanks go to ChatGPT for counting the characters in *Harry Potter and the Three Exclamation Points*. I'm not going to check that right now.

Analyzed since 2025 Sarah Pally In her column "Blossoms and Pearls", she uses industry-related terms and comments on them with a personal touch, from a linguistic perspective - as well as with a precise view of developments in the industry. Pally is a partner in the Partner & Partner agency in Winterthur. She has been working in the fields of content marketing, text/concept and storytelling in the communications and marketing sector for 15 years.

For a long time, customer insights didn’t have a particularly good reputation. In many companies, they’re either dismissed with a scoff («We know our customers, after all») or simply ignored («Market research is too expensive»). The result: decisions are made based on gut feelings—and often turn out to be wrong.

Now, of all places, Silicon Valley is rebranding this topic. The discussion there is currently shifting—away from technology and toward something that has long been difficult to pin down: taste. Given that products, features, and even entire apps can be built in record time today, a new problem is emerging. If anyone can produce anything quickly, suddenly almost everything becomes interchangeable. So the real question is: How do you differentiate yourself in a world where execution is no longer a bottleneck? The answer you’re hearing more and more often these days: Taste.

What’s interesting here is that “taste” doesn’t refer to style, interior design, or fashion. Rather, it refers to something much more fundamental. “Taste” describes the ability to decide what should be built in the first place—and what shouldn’t. It’s about judgment. It’s about understanding what people really want, what they value, and what matters to them. Or to put it another way: “Taste” is nothing more than a profound understanding of customer insights. Because that’s exactly what people in Silicon Valley are realizing right now: When technology becomes limitless, human judgment becomes the bottleneck. A developer recently summed it up: When you can implement every idea immediately, the real skill is no longer building, but choosing.

The solution? Not more output. But better understanding. Of course, this is nothing new in marketing. Good marketers have always known that the decisive competitive advantage lies not in the campaign, but in the insight behind it. Not in «what we say,» but in «why it’s relevant to someone.» The only thing new is the term. And perhaps that’s exactly the point: over the years, «customer insights» had lost some of their appeal. They sounded like research reports, like PowerPoint slides, like something you “still had to do.” And in the heat of the moment, this step was sometimes forgotten or skipped altogether.

"Taste," on the other hand, sounds like sound judgment. Like relevance. Like something that’s hard to copy. Still, this term is a bit hard to understand. But maybe this rebranding is actually doing the term “customer insights” a world of good.

About the author

Prof. Dr. Johanna Gollnhofer is an associate professor of marketing and one of the co-directors of the Institute for Marketing and Customer Insight at the University of St. Gallen (IMC-HSG). Johanna Gollnhofer

Prices have always been important. But rarely have they been as much in the spotlight as they are today. Many Swiss households are keeping a closer eye on their spending, comparing prices more carefully, and postponing purchase decisions. Consumer sentiment in the spring of 2026 was well below the long-term average¹. At the same time, numerous consumers indicated in surveys that they wanted to reduce their spending².

This increases the pressure on companies. Higher costs cannot simply be passed on, because price increases are being viewed with increasing skepticism. Discounts are losing their element of surprise and are now expected. Growth is becoming less and less a given. It is precisely during such phases that a widespread misunderstanding becomes apparent: Many companies treat Prices Pricing is primarily seen as a mathematical problem. However, customers perceive prices as a signal. Successful pricing is therefore based not on numbers, but on customers’ willingness to pay.

The price is never just the price

A price rarely stands on its own. It conveys messages: high quality, fair, risky, affordable, cheap, or unnecessarily expensive. The same amount can come across completely differently depending on the context. 49 francs for a T-shirt seems high to many people. 49 francs for a skincare product may seem reasonable. 49 francs for a software subscription is often accepted if it saves time. Willingness to pay is also frequently situational—it’s higher for a Coke at a gas station convenience store than at a supermarket. Prices aren’t judged in absolute terms. They’re interpreted.

Perception is often stronger than reality

Research conducted by the University of St. Gallen showed that price differences with neighboring countries are sometimes significantly overestimated³. This is revealing. It is not only actual prices that influence behavior—perceptions of prices, i.e., price image, are also relevant to price perception.

Most purchasing decisions are made more quickly and on a more emotional basis than we’d like to believe. Only afterward do we try to justify the purchase with rational arguments. Often, a feeling comes first: desire, security, trust, relief, recognition—or even the desire to avoid a (perceived) loss.

Methods such as conjoint analysis can be used to measure which combinations of price, performance, brand, or service are actually preferred—and what consumers are actually willing to pay more for. Implicit methods also help identify what people do not always say directly or strategically conceal. This often reveals that it is not the lowest price that wins, but rather the most coherent overall package.

The Major Misconception Behind Many Pricing Strategies

In many companies, pricing is still discussed primarily internally: margins, competition, leeway, promotions. The real question, however, is: How does the customer perceive this price?

What companies can learn from this: If you want to set prices more effectively, you shouldn’t just crunch numbers—you need to understand the market. Pricing isn’t just about numbers. It’s an intense focus on market understanding and market communication.

The price is often printed in small print on the packaging, in the store, or in the offer. Yet it has a big impact.

If you just calculate pricing, all you see are numbers.
Those who understand pricing can predict behavior.

… Actually People rarely make decisions based solely on price. They make decisions based on the feeling that a price evokes.

Philipp Fessler Klaus Ammon and I have a combined total of more than 50 years of experience in consumer research and marketing research. During this time, we have seen many pricing methods emerge—and some disappear again. What has remained is the conviction that good pricing research never ends with numbers. After all, prices have not only a mathematical impact but also an emotional one. What matters, therefore, is not only what people can afford to pay, but also what feels right, fair, or valuable to them. Management Tools has been working precisely at this intersection of data, perception, and behavior for many years.

Sources

1. SECO / State Secretariat for Economic Affairs, Swiss Consumer Sentiment, Spring 2026.
2. Swiss surveys on savings intentions for late 2025 / early 2026.
3. University of St. Gallen, Studies on Shopping Tourism and Price Perception

Switzerland/Abroad

4. 2026 Consumption & Savings Monitor by sda awp in cooperation with management tools, December 2025: https://www.presseportal.ch/de/pm/100103209/100937386

I have a problem, no, rather a need: it's like a compulsion to maintain my autonomy at certain moments. It's not about crucial things, but about small things in life, such as an IKEA shelf or a tomato sauce.

I can't bring myself to read the instructions at IKEA, it just doesn't work, and every time I reach the eighth screw and look at the crack in the wood, I think that it can't be right. The same thing happens to me regularly with tomato sauce, I've never followed a recipe before, it's unique every time, and unfortunately often bad, if I can tell from the looks on my children's faces as they push the Pasta Napoli to one side with that look of rejection and incomprehension.

At IKEA, I now usually have things delivered with an assembly service and when it comes to pasta, I now only use ready-made sauce.

Psychologically, this phenomenon is called reactance, an inner motivation to restore a threatened freedom. I'm not sure why I feel my freedom is under threat, but it might be interesting to investigate further. As long as it stays with such small things, the consequences are manageable. If I were a carpenter or chef, it would be a different story. The impact on business would be devastating.

In the corporate image world, however, reactance is the order of the day. I know this because I have often been involved. It wasn't my reactivity that was the problem, but the briefing specifications from the company itself. Because if you don't know exactly what you want even after reading it for the fourth time, and here I'm excluding obtuseness as a reason, the last option is to simply do what you think. Sometimes it worked, sometimes not. The feedback? Usually nothing ... silence. Or a "Mmh ... yes ... ok" without any further explanation. And how could they - if nobody knows what the brand is visually about, nobody can say whether the result is right.

A system that suited everyone

If we are honest: It suited everyone, except perhaps the brand managers. But you rarely got to see them during production. The agency, who preferred creative freedom to tight specifications. The photographer, who preferred to do his thing rather than work through checklists. The marketing team, who didn't have time for another basic document. Everyone benefited - well, almost everyone, except the brand.

I've seen a lot over the years and have already given the mood boards names. There was the "untraceable", which you simply couldn't find because it either didn't really exist or the client just didn't like it. Or the "Egalo", one page, four pictures and three adjectives. The "Penible" was particularly laborious, 47 pages with countless details but no clear line.

A study of 598 marketing managers shows the extent of this: less than half have a style guide at all, and of those who have one, only half actually use it. At the same time, 82 percent feel insecure when making visual decisions, which is a toxic combination for consistent brand management.

To make this clear once again: Images are not decoration, they are the container for brand codes and emotions. And yet, in reality, it is often pretended that the image is the icing on the cake of a good headline. Nice to have, but something is enough. The problem is that a lead agency used to ensure visual consistency. Those days are over. Today, five service providers and three internal teams work in parallel, all with the best of intentions, all "by feel". The result is visual cacophony.

The empty promise

Tool providers are now bursting into this situation with their promises. "Generate your visual world in seconds." "Brand-consistent visuals at the touch of a button." "AI that understands your brand." That sounds tempting. And it's dangerous nonsense. Not because the tools are bad. But because they presuppose a foundation that most companies have never laid. They sell roof tiles to people without a house.

Prompts, i.e. the text instructions to the AI, work better the more clearly the task is defined. A prompt that is not based on clear guidelines and simply somehow describes a brand ("authentic, emotional, credible") delivers exactly that: somehow results. Generic, interchangeable, ineffective. If you don't tell it precisely what your brand is all about, it will deliver the average of the internet. And the average is slop - or looks like the competition. The problem is not the AI. The problem is that we can't give it any useful instructions because we ourselves don't know what actually constitutes our visual world. We never wrote the instructions. And now we wonder why the tomato sauce doesn't taste good.

The inconvenient truth

Despite all the euphoria about the new possibilities of generative AI and its promise to revolutionize communication quickly, widely and cheaply: Before we discuss AI tools, we need to talk about foundations. About visual worlds worthy of the name. About guidelines that are more than three adjectives on a PowerPoint slide. About expertise that enables people to make good visual decisions - and recognize bad ones. The solution is neither complicated nor new. It just requires us to follow the sequence: First understand what makes your brand visual. Then develop guidelines that are precise enough for both humans and machines to work with. Then build up the expertise to assess the results. Internally. Not delegable. Generative AI is not the problem. It is the mirror that shows us what we have always failed to do: Treating visual worlds as what they are - a strategic tool.

For those who understand this, AI becomes an accelerator. For everyone else, it remains an expensive disappointment machine, like my tomato sauce without a recipe ... in most cases anyway.

The author

Per Kasch began on stage, then moved behind the camera and photographed international advertising campaigns and visual worlds for over 15 years. Today, with SightEffect, he advises companies such as Fraport, AXA, Sanitas and Radeberger on their visual strategy - in particular through AI-ready guidelines and measurable expertise.

Perhaps this is the reason why small moments of genuine encounters suddenly touch us so deeply. They remind us of something that we have never completely lost - but had almost forgotten: that humanity cannot be planned.

When routine meets reality

A young employee at the station counter says to a passenger: "I don't know, but I'll make a quick call to the control center." No script, no process, just a brief moment of sincerity. Or a baker who doesn't respond to a social media question with a template, but posts a photo of his handwritten note: "Yes, the bread was too dark yesterday. Sorry." They are tiny gestures, but they make us feel that authenticity has a temperature.

Authenticity is not a style - it is a risk

You can train friendliness, but not warmth. You can simulate empathy, but not what happens between two people when one really listens to the other. Authenticity means not knowing something and showing it anyway. In a world that optimizes everything, this is an almost rebellious act.

Authenticity requires courage - even in a corporate context. When a CEO doesn't come across as perfect in an interview, but is briefly searching for words, it creates a moment that is more credible than any polished formulation. Because it shows that you mean business.

The return of imperfection

Many companies are beginning to realize that perfection does not create closeness. Some are consciously doing without chatbots, others are showing real employees in their advertising again, not models. A hospital in Zurich has started to train doctors not to end a conversation when the facts have been clarified - but when the other person is breathing more calmly. Such changes are quiet, but they are happening.

Authenticity arises when people no longer hide behind systems. When an insurance company sends understanding rather than forms after a claim. When a retailer says after a mistake: "That was our fault and we'll make it right." In these moments, trust is not communicated, but experienced.

When systems reach their limits

There are times when even the best systems don't know what to do. When an AI responds in a friendly manner to an ironic comment in a customer chat, but doesn't understand the irony. When an automated hotline says "Thank you for your understanding" - and loses the very trust it claims. It is precisely where technology fails that humanity begins again: because a human being has to take over. And often what no machine can do happens: Someone really listens.

Perhaps we notice the real thing when we forget for a moment what we wanted to say - and are still understood. These small interruptions in the hustle and bustle of everyday life are not disruptions, but reminders that communication is more than just information.

Listening as an attitude

Perhaps this is the real progress of our time: not that machines can do more and more, but that we are beginning to sense what they cannot replace. Consumer listening - properly understood - does not mean analyzing even more deeply, but learning to listen again where no answer is expected.

Authenticity is not revealed in the brilliance of systems, but in the small moments when someone is fully present. And perhaps this is the quietest form of the future: technology will not become more human - but we can become so again.

True authenticity arises where people really meet - in personal conversations, in open meetings, in moments that are not optimized but shared. Perhaps this is where the real art of modern communication lies: no longer talking about people, but with them.

By the way ...

You can feel the real thing, even if you don't know why.

Laura Colledani and Klaus Ammon have more than 40 years of combined experience in consumer research and marketing research. Over the years, they have developed a keen sense of what moves people - even beyond the numbers. Both authors advocate a communication culture that listens before it broadcasts. With the new approach of consumer listening management tools, they want to support marketing managers in not only questioning consumers in the traditional way, but also entering into a genuine relationship with them.

A kitschy fever dream from which, at best, only scraps of meaning remain, together with a queasy feeling in the stomach. Absolutely not a feast for the senses - but drinkable!

"Purpose-driven growth", "sustainable disruption", "agile resilience" .... Either makes no sense at all or is so unclear that it is no longer tangible with the best will in the world. But it doesn't hurt anyone and it's not even a lie - it would have to mean something. So the stuff goes down like nothing. And it easily fills pages without having to say anything perceptible. Ideal stuffing material for webpages, annual reports, claims - you name it.

The fate of the good guys

What has happened? Why have really good terms suddenly become bullshit - where is the tipping point? "Sustainable" and "agile" and all the others were once young, fresh and really strong, they were different from the others and triggered something. That's probably why they ended up in the heavy rotation of the copy-paste society and were so polished that you can no longer feel anything when you read them.

We always pretend that it's because of the terms that they are essentially bullshit. But they're not: being bullshit is the fate of the good guys. And sometimes you can tease this out in context, giving the term a brief appearance in the spotlight in a clever, surprising formulation feature.

R.I.P "Sustainability"

But new bullshit terms will be brought to light and initially enjoy sudden attention as unexpected stars, only to be brutally dropped. For some, it happens very quickly, such as "edgy", while others last quite a long time, such as "sustainable" - nomen est omen. That's why these bullshit dinosaurs in particular deserve a little more respect: they really got to the heart of something important for once, and they still dance at almost every wedding.

But even these terms will be forgotten at some point. Perhaps forever, perhaps with a bit of luck they will be resurrected by the Ubernext Gen. In any case, they have served well: Thanks to them, millions of people have reaped approval and admiration without ever actually having formulated anything clearly. Thank you and R.I.P Sustainability and Co.

Creation is a fermenting process and sometimes agonizing, painful, existential. And just like giving birth, afterwards you are exhausted, diffusely happy, diffusely proud and, above all, glad that it's over. And also a little blinded: Isn't it the prettiest, cleverest baby (probably not)? Or completely terrified: Isn't it the most horrible, useless thing I've ever thought of (probably not, unfortunately)?

That's why we would like to protect it a little longer. The work, the idea, the text, the spot, the concept, the logo - the result of this inwardly raging micro-apocalypse. What if it is not properly understood? If it touches no one, interests no one? If it fizzles out quietly - or at the wrong time, like a firecracker that goes off too early?

At least disturb

Criticism is like the weather: sometimes surprising, sometimes less so, sometimes sunny, sometimes icy - rarely balanced, but often inappropriate. That's part of it. Because good creation doesn't want to please everyone - it wants to say something, show something, disturb something or simply stick. That's why the worst of the terrible criticism is: That the work under discussion does absolutely none of these things.

The more difficult the process was, the more criticism there is. Unfortunately, suffering is no guarantee of quality. Something that has been thrown out can be just as good or bad as something that has been thought through for a long time. That's unfair, but true.

And yet you do it again and again. Because there is no satisfaction quite like when something suddenly takes shape - out of all the fog in your head, out of all the loose ends, out of what was previously just a fleeting idea.

Fear of the weather

It becomes problematic when you no longer dare to do anything because of criticism - out of fear of the weather, so to speak. When you prefer to sketch forever instead of finishing something. When everything gets stuck in the draft stage. And no, even a finished work is of course never really "finished" and certainly not perfect.

You're always wiser with hindsight - and with a bit of distance you usually realize that the baby wasn't actually that pretty/smart/unique. But it was actually quite okay. And sometimes the unexpected happens and you realize: Wow, that was actually really good. But mostly it's just the former, and that's a hell of a lot.

Because ultimately, good creation is not the result of perfection, but of courage. The courage to show something that you don't yet fully understand. The courage to face judgment - and your own gaze. The hardest of all.

Analyzed since 2025 Sarah Pally In her column "Blossoms and Pearls", she uses industry-related terms and comments on them with a personal touch, from a linguistic perspective - as well as with a precise view of developments in the industry. Pally is a partner in the Partner & Partner agency in Winterthur. She has been working in the fields of content marketing, text/concept and storytelling in the communications and marketing sector for 15 years.

The Smarties test known from developmental psychology puts it in a nutshell: children see a Smarties package and naturally think there are Smarties inside. But surprise - there are pencils inside.

It's about suggestion. You think you know something because you deduce it from certain information. But you don't really know it. Suggestion is therefore the opposite of information and has the advantage or disadvantage (depending on your perspective) that you don't necessarily notice the difference.

Can. Maybe. If.

Advertising naturally sees it as an advantage that people like to draw conclusions quickly - and feel particularly clever in the process. The product with "eco" in the name? Bought, because you want to take responsibility. The cream that made 99% women happy? You think of wrinkle-free faces, but maybe it was just the scent. And who are these women? How many were asked? And how many goodie bags were they bribed with? The obligatory asterisk only makes things even more nebulous: it suggests objectivity and is intended to prevent complaints about false advertising promises - which is also often enough a false conclusion. Or the product with "properties that may contribute to health promotion if you lead a healthy lifestyle", as the professional-looking gentleman in the objective coat earnestly promises. And he must know, as a professional advertising model.

But advertising is rarely a flat lie! It is more sophisticated: it is a realm of possibilities of false conclusions. A "can", a "possibly", a "almost everything for almost everyone", a "contributes to ...". Just like I could possibly contribute to almost taking out the garbage tomorrow - if the weather is right, my mood is right and nothing comes up. Can. Maybe. If. An elegant way of saying: maybe, but probably not.

We know that magic is tricked. With advertising, we are only half aware of it. That's why advertising occasionally slips from the world of magic into the realm of tricksters.

Fish for Kant

More often than we highly rational Kantians would like, we overlook important subtleties - the not-really-promises and suggestive charges are too seductive. We can't and don't want to check or question any of this. And the legal situation basically ensures that we can rely a little on what is suggested. However, the matter is as difficult to grasp as a floundering fish and just as dazzling.

Some of what is suggested could also be recognized with common sense - if one were to make the effort. Or does anyone really think that Smarties make you smart? Of course not - they are only called that because they can be used to measure the cognitive maturity of children. Because the test goes even further: the key question for the children is: what would someone think if they didn't know the actual contents of the box? Children who answer "still that there are Smarties inside" have recognized the mechanism (and qualify directly for the advertising industry). They are considered more cognitively advanced than those who answer "that there are pencils inside". QED.

Analyzed since 2025 Sarah Pally In her column "Blossoms and Pearls", she uses industry-related terms and comments on them with a personal touch, from a linguistic perspective - as well as with a precise view of developments in the industry. Pally is a partner in the Partner & Partner agency in Winterthur. She has been working in the fields of content marketing, text/concept and storytelling in the communications and marketing sector for 15 years.

Dancing parents

Are "the young" really that easy to dupe? I hope not - and I don't believe it either. Youth language in advertising is already embarrassing for most adults. Because it's unskilled, desperate. Like when the parents come along to the party; and also dance. They would have to be very authentically cool parents.

Or is the use of youth language perhaps quite clever, the good old manipulative age trick: we don't want to appeal to the young - we want to appeal to the adults! By pretending to address the young, and then the old feel young themselves, because they think it's good and feel reminded of themselves, *gasp* and are proud that they still barely understand it, *gasp* so they feel implicitly addressed on a deeply emotional and positively charged level.... Check how clever?

You're just jealous

From experience: no... They really and desperately want to reach "the young" - and this desperation resonates. In general, youth language seems to have become a strange fetish. Why? Is it the fearfulness of adults? The fascination of the ugly? The allure of the forbidden? Or the memory of one's own youth? Just making fun of others again because your own life is so uneventful? Or even: envy?

Youth language should always exclude others. Yes, exactly you, Hans-Peter, and you, Rebekka. And me too. That's exactly what it's made for. Let's just leave it alone and let it be as great as it is. Because nothing demonstrates the flexibility of language better - at last it is being used properly, pushed beyond its limits, shredded beyond recognition and mashed together into something new.

And: nobody likes to be mimicked, but everyone likes to be taken seriously. Perhaps that would be an approach to reach "the young"? It's best to simply ask them yourself - if you dare to make contact.

Analyzed since 2025 Sarah Pally In her column "Blossoms and Pearls", she uses industry-related terms and comments on them with a personal touch, from a linguistic perspective - as well as with a precise view of developments in the industry. Pally is a partner in the Partner & Partner agency in Winterthur. She has been working in the fields of content marketing, text/concept and storytelling in the communications and marketing sector for 15 years.

If your own brand or product name makes it into the dictionary, then "you've made it". The preliminary stage of this is being used as a verb or umbrella term. Of course, this actually happens quite rarely and this exclusivity alone makes it a kind of distinction. But can this quasi-immortality be bent somehow?

When a new brand or a new product is launched, particularly shrewd marketers like to briefly check whether the name suggestions floating around could also be used as a verb or as an umbrella term. But this is hardly relevant. After all, language can do almost anything anyway - and whether it sounds "nice" doesn't really matter in the end. If someone had these thoughts back then at the "Bostitch" company in the USA: Chapeau! But then the product or the company would probably have a different name. It doesn't get much stranger than that.

Stapler? Stapler?

But Bostitch has just solved a problem. And we're not talking about the loose sheets of paper fluttering around. Apparently, at least in Switzerland, there didn't seem to be a satisfactory name for this device and the associated activity, so the company name Bostitch was quickly coined. Did this thing and the associated activity not even exist in Switzerland before? Or was "stapler" and "stapling device" simply too German? In any case, it struck a nerve of sorts, filling a linguistic vacuum. So well, in fact, that many people no longer even know that Bostitch is not a device, but a company. Some even think it's a technical term from the stationery industry.

One might argue that it would be an absolute worst case scenario if the product is a huge success - but unfortunately the name cannot be used as a verb! As is supposedly the case with Galaxus: Or have you ever galaxed today (or would it be "gelaxt" or "gegölaxt", as a mixture of gegönnt and Galaxus)? The problem here is that galaxus does not solve a problem linguistically, because there is no problem: There is simply no need to find another word for "bestellen" or "Onlineshop". That's bad luck for Galaxus.

Create the problem and then solve it

The name "Google" is also not at all a good verbalization, but it has crept in without hesitation. Because it is simply better than "searching for something on the Internet using a search engine". With "Twinten", the corresponding activity simply didn't exist before the product - a forced verbalization, so to speak. Or to put it another way: along with the product, Twint also created the linguistic problem that it immediately solved again.

Sure: in hindsight, everything seems somehow logical. But it helps to think about whether there is even a linguistic necessity or gap that can be filled before thinking about the most elegant verbalized application of a new brand or product name. And even then: if Bostitch makes it into everyday language, then so can others.

Of course, there are also these desperate attempts to use the name as a verb or umbrella term via advertising. Like "Nogger yourself one!". Go ahead and google it, preferably via image search. Together with this absurd appearance, it was somehow weird enough for the slogan to be dropped sarcastically. After all, it has made itself virtually immortal in its own way as a dubious but much-used example of the problem at hand.

Analyzed since 2025 Sarah Pally In her column "Blossoms and Pearls", she uses industry-related terms and comments on them with a personal touch, from a linguistic perspective - as well as with a precise view of developments in the industry. Pally is a partner in the Partner & Partner agency in Winterthur. She has been working in the fields of content marketing, text/concept and storytelling in the communications and marketing sector for 15 years.