R.U.B.O.Q.?

A few days ago, the Bank of Queensland launched this re-brand.

And since then – and like many launches of late – it's attracted mixed reviews, most notably here.

So I thought I'd add my own thoughts into the mix with this comment that I left on Mumbrella:

I've been interested to read the discussion here about this campaign and the idea behind it, but it seems everyone is focusing on the issue from a purely visual perspective or in terms of production. And ignoring the fact they've changed their name from Bank of Queensland to BOQ, as well as the potential reasons why – which is a pretty big deal.

When it comes to choosing names – for babies or banks – it's always difficult. But what's even more intriguing about this case is that while their campaign is all about being small and personal, their change of name says exactly the opposite.

Firstly, choosing an acronym is the surest way to strip any emotion and meaning from a word. Acronyms typically lack personality and make it hard for people to remember what they stood for in the first place. Which, unfortunately, does not resonate with their new tagline "Your own personal bank".

Secondly, it's interesting to think about why they switched to an acronym. The likeliest reasons are more to do with a commercial rather than a creative strategy. They want to put some clear water between the brand and the word "bank", as well as lose the restrictions that come with the geographical tag "Queensland".

In other words, this isn't about getting smaller, this is about getting bigger. Much bigger.

So what will it be? A small, local bank with the personal touch? Or, an international institution that hides behind a faceless acronym? Looks like they're keeping their options open for now.

Christmas comedown

I meant to post this a few weeks ago, but better late than never.

It's about Christmas trees. And I must admit to feeling more than a little guilty – emotionally and environmentally.

Here's what became of ours.

Once a sparkling beacon of light and joy in our living room. Now a little shabby and bare out in the yard.

And here's more (all photographed with a little more flair than my own iPhone effort above).

What's worse, my feelings were not instinctive. Instead, what originally started me off down this path was a blog by a friend of mine, Ingrid – the Aesthetics of Joy.

In her recent post On Christmas trees and emotional sustainability, Ingrid writes about the idea that the emotional meaning of objects is transformed by their context. In other words: "Before December 25th, a Christmas tree is an aesthetic of joy and anticipation. After Jan 2nd, it's trash to be dealt with, with connotations of loss and sadness."

And so began my own feelings of guilt.

How does it feel to feel?

My Friday afternoon took a rather sinister turn after a fight broke out at Melbourne airport.

A couple of guys walked through the terminal, found their man, and then came a violent eruption of punches until a couple of brave passengers stood between them. The attackers checked themselves, uttered a few choice words about broken noses, and then turned and traced their steps back through the airport.

It was all over quite quickly, but the emotion in the air was intense.

Admiration for the brave men who had put themselves in the middle of the melee, and stopped the fight from going any further. Fear from the female Qantas ground staff who found themselves in the thick of it as the fight spilled behind the customer service desk. And a mixture of anxiety, shock and excitement swirled around the scene, along with pretty much every other emotion you care to name.

And it reminded me of just how emotionally charged we are – as a species, I mean.

Yes, granted we spend a great deal of time thinking – "Cogito ergo sum", as Descartes once famously pronounced – but so much of our existence also relies upon our capacity to feel.

Earlier this week, Adam Ferrier wrote in his blog, Consumer Psychologist, about the Melbourne Cup, gambling and the concept of variable positive reinforcement – the practice of rewarding desired behaviour (for example, gambling) at random times and with random amounts. And he wondered why marketers didn't use this concept more often and not just in promotions, under the pretext that, "If it's the strongest conditioner of human behaviour, shouldn't marketers be trying to understand it and applying its principles in a slightly more sophisticated way"?

Again, what Adam is raising here is the very visceral nature of the human race – ideas that relate to our deepest inward feelings rather than to our intellect.

The automotive industry, for one, has always worked hard on designing a human feel to its cars. Not simply when it comes to how they function, but also how they look. In fact, most cars smile.

If you look at the VW Beetle or the new model Mazda 3 (just to name a couple), the bonnet, grille and headlights are often designed and positioned to mirror a human face. And a happy one at that.

At the opposite end of the scale to happiness is loss – specifically death, in the form of cult brand, Death Cigarettes.

Here's some of the on-pack copy:

A pack of Death cigarettes leaves no doubt as to the risks of smoking. We don't print a health warning just because it's law. We believe in telling the truth...a responsible way to market a legally available consumer product which kills people when used exactly as intended.

You couldn't get a more honest smoke.

As humans, we are a complex race full of raw emotion and feeling. They say the truth hurts, and they're right. But not because it's true in thought, more so because it hurts our feelings.

So it is, that the most successful brands are often also the most primal. And if you ask me, that feels just about right.

More than words

Humans are an inquisitive bunch, demonstrated no less than when we wonder what such-and-such would say if only the baby-pet-car-thingamajig could speak.

More often than not it's a rhetorical question. Nevertheless, I wonder whether it may also be a question asked in vain, given the propensity of most of those blessed with the power of speech to default to the drearier corners of the English language. Words are no less a form of self expression than a means of communication, however, most people rely on their words for mere data transfer.

Like humans, many brands also try to strike up conversations with those around them.

Try me, buy me, cook with me, look at me.

Yet they seem to struggle just as much as humans when it comes to using their voice as a vehicle to convey emotion. Communications feel cold and corporate, jargon jockeying for position amid an avalanche of acronyms. You can have the most pleasant and rewarding conversation with the person in the call centre, only to receive the standard, automated letter from the call centre's computer. It may very well provide a neat summary of your discussion with word perfect precision, but you are now left wondering if you are really a customer to be cared for or simply a statistic to be served.

I read a piece earlier this week from The Writer, an agency in London that specialises in writing (not surprisingly), in which they were discussing the language of the car industry.

It started with Mercedes-Benz, that colossus of German engineering, and the way Mercedes describe the SL 65 AMG Black Series (a long name, I know!) in standard yet soulless fashion. "The new design reduces exhaust gas back-pressure. The acoustic side effect of this is to produce a distinctive 12-cylinder sound, from the two trapezoidal tail-pipes."

There's nothing necessarily wrong with what Mercedes have written, but you do have to wonder whether they've missed the point of a sports car at full speed. Especially when you consider the energy that Lamborghini inject into their language. "The exhaust in this car makes a sound that ranges from the heavy rumble of a stormy night, through the trumpeting of mighty elephants, through to the roar of a raging lion."

The difference is startling. It's not just what you say, but it's how you say it.

In some other bits and pieces I've read this week, I found a comparison of two famous authors, William Faulkner and Ernest Hemmingway, in the way in which they write about feeling tired.

In the words of Faulkner. "He did not still feel weak, he was merely luxuriating in that supremely gutful lassitude of convalescence in which time, hurry, doing, did not exist, the accumulating seconds and minutes and hours to which in its well state the body is slave both waking and sleeping, now reversed and time now the lip-server and mendicant to the body’s pleasure instead of the body thrall to time’s headlong course."

Or, according to Hemmingway. "Manuel drank his brandy. He felt sleepy. It was too hot to go out into the town. Besides there was nothing to do. He wanted to see Zurito. He would go to sleep while he waited."

Neither is right or wrong. For all that you feel from the words of Faulkner, each thought flowing freely into the next, the brevity of Hemmingway makes for an equally powerful statement, every word loaded with impact. If only brands recruited as many great writers as graphic designers, then maybe the best looking brands wouldn't feel like such a let down as soon as they started to speak.

A few years back, I remember reading an interview with Brett Anderson, lead singer of an English band named Suede who found fame in the 90s. He was talking about how, for better or worse, everything should create an emotional response. Love and hate were always better than an indifferent shrug of the shoulders.

The next week, arch rivals Blur released their latest album and, in another publication, Brett Anderson was asked for his opinion. Two simple words said it all. "It's ok."

I worry that most brands strike a similar note of indifference, to the point that the language they use becomes unnoticeable. Undifferentiated, uninspiring, unimpressive.

As much as humans can be inquisitive – as I wrote at the top of this blog – we are also reputed to use only a small percentage of our brain power. Likewise, brands often fail to take advantage of anything more than the bare minimum when it comes to the breadth of language available to them and the range of emotions that their words can explore.

Brands need to speak to their audiences. But that means more than words.