Well, that does not fulfill all criteria for a good slogan: it does
not describe a benefit for someone (contrary to "making your users
smile").
It is just a descriptive claim statement - and you may simply
agree or
disagree and discuss hours about it.
There's a difference between Nokia (to stay with your example) and
GNUstep: Everybody knows what Nokia is (a rubber boot manufacturer,
right ;-)) but GNUstep has not that mindshare (yet). So the purpose
of a slogan for Nokia is different to the purpose of a slogan for
us: Nokia wants to improve its public image while we try to get
into the heads at all, try to straighten some common misconceptions
about GNUstep.
Nokia has used this slogan (tagline) since 15 years to get into our
heads and straighten the misconception that they make rubber boots...
So I think a descriptive claim statement is exactly what we need at
the moment, some "feel good" statement can follow up later when we
don't need to explain any longer what GNUstep is. (Try it for
yourself: Tell some computer related people that you are involved
into GNUstep. You surely get the reply: "GNUstep - what's that?").
... and then, you start to smile (because you know yourself "GNUstep
- makes your users smile") and reply (with a smile in your face) that
GNUstep is the greatest thing on world they never have heared of.
If you smile (emotion) when giving your answer it is very convincing
to others.
So let's not do the second step before the first one.
The "feel good with" is the only purpose of a brand building effort.
Psychologists have found that we can much better remember anything if
it is emotionally biased. Anyone who is interested in facts can
already read the "what it is" on the tons of web pages we already have.
And the first lesson for potential GNUsteppers is that they simply
remember that "GNUstep" exists. "What it is" is the second step.
How did Nokia come to their 99% mind-share? Because they did the
second step first. Nokia did have their "connecting people" right
from the beginning, just after they decided to no longer make rubber
but to connect people ( In this document from 2001 they say that they
have already used this tagline for a long time: http://
press.nokia.com/PR/200111/840959_5.html ).
When someone asked 15 years ago (when nobody did know much about
mobile phones) "who is Nokia?" they said: "Nokia is a leader in
mobile communications and connecting people to people." Then, one
thinks: oh, great, they do something with benefit for real people.
They care about us. And they are obviously proud of doing it. This
must be good and the future.
If they would have said: "Nokia is a maker of mobile phones in
Finland with 30 keys and 50cm antenna", then people would have thought:
- what do I need a mobile phone for?
- can they do that in Finland at all?
- isn't this expensive?
- why doesn't it have 31 keys?
- etc.?
People immediately start to compare and argue if you start with facts.
Now, if people ask "GNUstep - what's that?", why can't we answer
right from the beginning: "GNUstep makes your users smile" (and you
can add verbally: because it is a great framework for building
applications). People will feel good by this answer and remeber much
better that GNUstep is good for users and for them.
If you just say "GNUstep it is a great framework for building
applications." people will start to compare with others (GTK, Qt,
wWidgets, ...) and you will do a lot of technical argueing if C, C+
or Obj-C is better.
Well, this is just my 2 cents from more than 10 years in working in a
product management and marketing department of a competitor of
Nokia :) So, we should learn from the good examples.
Finally, the GNUstep community must come to a conclusion. So, who
takes care of voting (as indicated by the subject)? Or don't we need
one?
Nikolaus
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