I recently had a debate with a nonprofit marketing guru on whether or not the brand promise for an organization was the same as the tagline. Yes, I know that this is the kind of question tha

And before you role your eyes at the word “guru” as overused hyperbole let me reassure you that Joe Fay, Executive Director at Children’s Brain Tumor Foundation, really is my marketing guru. He taught me most of what I know about the importance of branding for the nonprofit sector, and I admire him more than any boss I ever had (and I have had some good ones!)

Joe thinks the tagline is the perfect summation of the brand and that a good tagline says it all.

Because the word tagline is marketing jargon, I’ll define it. The tagline is that marketing message used consistently with your organization’s name and logo. For more on taglines and how to create great ones, read my older post on this subject.

At Mission Minded, though, we believe that there’s a step that comes before the tagline: the brand promise. The brand promise is a summation of all of the essential ingredients of your brand:

Personality
Brand Values
Value Proposition
Brand Positioning (how you’re positioned relative to your competition)

The brand promise is a summation of these elements and is written for an internal audience — and used as a guidepost by which to measure the effectiveness of all external communications in conveying that promise.

Our view is that a good brand promise works as an internal rallying cry. A good tagline is an external marketing message that inspires your audience to understand and support you.

Here’s a good example from a recent re-branding engagement we ran for National Equity Project. The brand promise is “personal empowerment to make change” and is written to remind internal stakeholders what to convey externally. But to actually convey that brand promise their new tagline became:
- See more at: http://mission-minded.com/blog/is-your-tagline-the-same-as-your-brand-promise/#sthash.76iE8HH7.dpuf

Work Terms

The brand promise, as written, is fairly lackluster. That’s because it is written to summarize the elements of the entire brand architecture and isn’t meant to dazzle. But the tagline is meant to be a powerful call to action for everyone who comes in contact with National Equity Project.

We counsel our clients not to shortcut the brand development process by going straight to trying to write a clever tagline. How can you know you’ve written a good tagline without first knowing what idea(s) you’re trying to convey about your organization?

What’s your opinion? If you’ve had success doing it our way or Joe’s way we’d love to hear from you.
facebooktwitterlinkedin

sharethisemail Tags: Nonprofit Branding, nonprofit marketing, Nonprofit Messaging, Nonprofit Taglines
About the Author

Jennie Winton is a Founding Partner of Mission Minded and a 20-year marketing veteran sought out for her expertise in branding and positioning nonprofit organizations.
See all posts by Jennie Winton
4 Comments

14-02-2011
Sarah Moore says:

This is a great reminder of why some folks think it’s “easy” to write a tagline. Sure, it’s fun to play with words (NY Times crossword puzzle, anyone?), but a tagline is really the external expression of a strategic idea. There’s often a lot more going on behind the scenes — the rigor to define clearly who you are, what you do, and why it matters. A tagline can point to that, can intrigue possible donors, volunteers or funders, but it can’t tell the whole story, nor should it.
19-02-2011
Lori Warren says:

The marketing world is littered with mediocre taglines that fade from memory quicker than the time it takes for a teenager to grab the last seat on the Bart train. And why? Because the hard work that helps a brand/organization fully define itself – including its personality, values and unique point of difference –

Attachments (Click to Preview)