25+ Best Tagline Examples: The Power of a Punchy Tagline

Have you ever heard those slogans that never seem to leave your mind? You know the ones; they’re the ones that you catch yourself singing or saying without even realising it. Slogans like “Just Do It” or “Think Different”. Those catchy little phrases are called taglines.

A great tagline is linguistic magic – it encapsulates a brand’s identity and plugs itself into your brain. It takes the overall positioning and condenses it into a bite-sized, portable package that follows you.

When they’re at their best, taglines don’t just make you think something about the brand – they make you feel something. They set off an emotional spark that forms a connection. They implant ideas and values in your head, affecting your look at that business or product.

But creating one of those sticky, memorable little suckers? That’s some severe marketing kung-fu.

Why a Powerful Tagline Matters (and How to Judge If Yours Kicks Butt)

A stellar tagline is pure marketing nitro. It's the headline for your entire brand. It has to sell your story in just a few sweetly stinging words.

Not only that, but it works hand-in-hand with your logo, driving home brand recognition. Great taglines guide people straight into the heart of what you're all about as a company. They resonate with audiences and separate you from the competition.

But how do you tell if you've nailed that game-changing micro-pitch?

A Truly Great Tagline Should:

• Encapsulate your brand positioning/promise
• Differentiate you from competitors
• Highlight a key benefit
• Spark an emotional reaction
• Be memorable and attention-grabbing
• Align with your brand identity/personality
• Work hard (reinforcing across platforms)
• Stand the test of time (sustain relevance)

Master all that in 3–8 words? Piece of cake, right? For Shakespeare. For the rest of us, it's one tough nut to crack.

Tag, You're It: 25 Killer Tagline Examples to Inspire You

Alright, word nerds, let's dive into some of the tastiest, most genius examples of tagline wizardry around. I've included notes on what makes each sizzle light your creative fires.

1. “Just Do It” — Nike

Simplicity in perfection. This tagline is energising, bold, and has incredible brand/motivational synergy. The imperative call-to-action grammar kicks you in the pants to stop overthinking and take action.

2. “Think Small” — Volkswagen (1959)

In an era of an automotive bigger-is-better mentality, this tiny tagline for the Beetle turned audience assumptions upside down. It spun a perceived product disadvantage into a charming differentiator.

3. “The Uncola” — 7-Up (1967)

The anti-brand stance of this tagline allowed 7-Up to sidestep comparisons to Coke and Pepsi. Defining what you're not can be clever positioning when taking on big rivals. It created a unique personality.

4. “The Milk Chocolate Melts in Your Mouth, Not in Your Hand” — M&Ms (1957)

This wordy tagline still sticks because it illustrates a key benefit in a clever, memorable way. The conversational phrasing complements the product with a fun, playful tone.

5. “Like a Good Neighbour, State Farm is There” — State Farm (1971)

Solid taglines make you feel something, and this one taps into those cosy feelings of security and protection associated with a “good neighbour” You can picture the helpful friend/relative right next door.

6. “The Quicker Picker Upper” — Bounty (1965)

Sometimes, you can distil the entire product benefit to a few perfectly descriptive words, as Bounty did here. This tagline immediately gets the superior product advantage across in a catchy way.

7. “Pizza Pizza” — Little Caesars (1979)

Repetition can reinforce a crucial product truth (they sell pizza, and lots of it) in a way that sticks in your brain forever. The straightforward, bouncy phrasing matches their affordable brand voice.

8. “A Diamond is Forever” — De Beers (1948)

What could be a better brand/product match-up than that classic tagline? In four simple words, it's a showstopper that immediately equates diamonds with priceless, eternal value.

9. “Can You Hear Me Now? Good.” — Verizon (2002)

This conversational tagline perfectly dramatised their positioning as a leader in network coverage. The straightforward back-and-forth dialogue tapped into a critical pain point surrounding phone service.

10. “Because You're Worth It” — L'Oréal (1973)

Personal, empowering taglines can hit home emotionally and rationally. This one struck a chord by celebrating a woman's self-worth while suggesting L'Oréal products as an affordable, luxurious treat.

11. “When It Rains, It Pours” — Morton Salt (1912!)

One of the oldest taglines around, Morton capitalised on the anger of salt failing in humid conditions — turning a weakness into a strength. Clever use of the double entendre on “pours”.

12. “Drivers Wanted” — Volkswagen (1995)

This tagline is so devilishly simple yet packed with emotional charge. VW used the provocative statement to rally free-thinking, independent drivers to their fun brand.

13. “A Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Waste” — United Negro College Fund (1972)

Using haunting, thought-provoking language, this classic non-profit line packs a memorable punch. It imparts the importance of their mission to help deserving students get educated.

14. “Did Somebody Say McDonald's?” — McDonald's (2003)

This tagline playfully leans into the irresistible craving for their food. The catchy, rhetorical question elicits a smile of recognition like an inside joke among fans.

15. “Red Bull Gives You Wings” — Red Bull (1987)

This energetic tagline fits the brand's rebellious, extreme personality like a glove. The “wings” visual metaphor vividly captures the energy and daring spirit they're selling in the bottle.

I could keep unpacking examples all day, but you get the idea. Let's round out this overview with a bunch more punchlines that nail it with ingenuity and sticking power:

16. “Open Happiness” — Coca-Cola (2009)
17. “The World's Local Bank” — HSBC (2002)
18. “Where's the Beef?” — Wendy's (1984)
19. “Shave Time. Shave Money.” — Dollar Shave Club (2011)
20. “Don't Leave Home Without It” — American Express (1975)
21. “You're Not You When You're Hungry” — Snickers (2010)
22. “We Try Harder” — Avis (1962)
23. “The Ultimate Driving Machine” — BMW (1973)
24. “Good Things Come to Those Who Wait” — Guinness (1936)
25. “Melts in Your Mouth, Not in Your Hands” — M&Ms (1954)

The Tasty Filling: Why a Lingering Tagline Stays on Brand

Now that we've unpacked some iconic tagline examples, let's take a second to savour what makes them so deliciously effective at sticking around.

Beyond just being catchy and creative, the juiciest taglines powerfully align with and amplify the entire brand identity they represent. They flow naturally from the company's core positioning, personality, and offerings.

For example, “Open Happiness” perfectly captures Coca-Cola's brand as a ubiquitous, classic drink that spreads simple pleasures worldwide. While “Break the Rules, Break the Grid” screams PUMA's youthful, edgy, athletic rebel positioning.

A great tagline aligns with the brand identity, like two peas in a pod. It lives and breathes the brand's personality, attitudes, and voice. Dollar Shave Club's “Shave Time. Shave Money.” pulses with personality — the casual, smart-alecky tonality you'd expect from their quirky brand persona.

This harmonious brand/tagline interplay is crucial. The words ring true because they're just putting voice to the existing core identity in a concentrated shot.

Put Some Muscle Into It: How to Craft a Killer Tagline

Enough drooling over other people's brilliant taglines. It's time to flex those creative muscles and whip up a show-stopping slogan.

This is where the real work begins—distilling a brand's essence and positioning into 3-8 powerhouse words. Not for the faint of heart.

But have no fear; there's a simple tagline brainstorming framework that can help spark those genius light bulbs. Just grab a pen and start wrestling with these prompts:

1. What tangible benefit(s) does your product/brand deliver? (Skills, feelings, services, enhancements, etc.)
2. How does it improve life for your customers/audiences in specific ways?
3. Describe your brand identity/personality in 3–5 adjectives.
4. What unique differentiators or “reasons to believe” separate you from the pack?
5. Capture your brand's inspiring higher purpose or customer aspiration in 1–2 sentences.

Work through those questions, jotting down ALL ideas on paper. No judging yet — just get your brand's core truths fleshed out.

See any repeated words, phrases, or themes starting to pop out? You'll likely want to nurture those seeds into your tagline's main concepts and language. Strong taglines play in the zone of your brand's most distinctive, compelling, motivating essence.

Once you have that golden concept, nuggets…

Time to Get Crafty:

• Run ideas through an online rhyming dictionary and thesaurus for creative word swaps
• Try converting benefits or purposes into crisp, active commands (e.g. “Think different”)
• Slice out all non-essential words until only the punchiest ones remain
• Strike a balance between branded vocabulary and conversational phrasing
• Record yourself saying options aloud to check for cadence and smooth recitation
• Audit potential lines against your brand identity adjectives
• Let wild rhymes, alliteration, and double meanings enhance memorability

Taglines often start chunky and built out, then get whittled to an aerodynamic final form through tons of refining.

The best ones pack a strategic punch while still being naturally sticky phrases people will want to quote, mimic, and spread. It's the magical fusion of art and science.

Checking Tagline Health: 5 Vital Signs of Life

So you made a snappy little word, baby — lovely! But how can you tell if this linguistic newborn has real sticking power? Audit against these five vital signs:

1. Differentiation: Does this tagline help you distinguish from others in your market? Does it highlight a compelling, unique sell for your brand's products/services?
2. Memorability: An overlooked but critical trait. Your tagline needs to carve a cosy brain-nesting spot for itself pretty instantaneously. Will this one sear itself into memory?
3. Flexibility: Can you envision this tagline looking badass and on-brand wherever you use it (advertising, packaging, digital campaigns)? Does it have adaptable legs?
4. Sustainability: I know brands are gipsy souls that are constantly evolving. However, the best taglines possess a timeless core that allows them to remain relevant as strategies shift. Will this one last?
5. Portability: Can you nimbly fold this tagline into marketing creative, updates, slogans, messaging, etc? Or is it boxed into a single expression and kind of…meh after that?

See room for optimising? Sites like PickFu and Upwave afford you A/B test options with real consumer audiences. Having fresh eyes vet your finalists = is priceless.

Oh, and don't sleep on the fact that…

The Perfect Tagline May Already Be Hiding in Plain Sight

That's right, sometimes the gems are secretly buried within your existing brand in:

• Your product/service's functional attributes
• Snippets of your core mission or higher purpose
• Uncommon words/phrases that all your people already use internally
• The exciting backstory or founding principles
• Old brand slogans that could be updated for today

So mine those rich brand quarries because the raw materials to your best tagline are often swirling around your brand's underground lore. You must melt it all down and reforge it into a new rallying cry.

The Tagline Graveyard: Anti-Examples of What Not to Do

Before we send you off brandishing your shiny new tagline, a brief pit stop through the Graveyard of Doomed Taglines. Pour one out for these cringe-worthy souls…as we learn what not to do:

• The Overly Wordy Rambler: “Our highly affordable, quality products and customer service deliver consistent value and convenience for multi-regional independent contractors.”

That's a mouthful, even before I fell asleep halfway through. I said a TAGLINE, not a complete marketing strategy deck.

• The Anti-Personality Void, “Quality goods, quality buys.”

ZZZ. Wake me when this bore-fest is over. Bland-on-bland messaging like this screams zero differentiation and makes me want to leave your non-personality behind.

• High Concept Word Salad “Untamed, Yet Responsible, Unoptimised Optimisation of the Transaction Quotidian.”

Do what now? I'm all for linguistical lipsmackery, but injecting your tagline with SAT words doesn't make you sound more intelligent — it just confuses me. Back to Thesaurus.com with you, sir!

• The Promised Land Mirage “Bringing Your Dreams to Life”

Sounds pretty! Yet tells me…nothing about what you do, or what's in it for me? It's more like “Bringing My Money to Your Dreams” for this company.

• The Real World Eye roller, “We Do Digital Better”

No, just no. Apart from being vague and non-differentiated in today's digital deluge, this line has a permanent Home on the Lamest Clichés Hit List. Come on, we can do better than that!

The takeaway: When crafting your tagline, strive for a perfect blend of remarkable distinctiveness and simple resonance. Give me something catchy yet precise, evocative but not over-engineered.

And for the love of branding, would somebody PLEASE…

Break the Golden Rule: When to Masterfully Zigzag from Conventions

You know how “common wisdom” tells you to always follow the Golden Rules of Tagline Creation, like:

• Be specific but universal
• Keep it mega-concise (3-6 words max)
• Align with both positioning and personality
• Highlight a single key benefit
• Authentically ladder up to a larger brand mission

Guidelines like those are great training wheels, but sometimes you must ditch the rulebook to rock a tagline. Sometimes, rules are made to be tastefully trampled on.

Like suggesting something absurd and letting the audience's imagination fill the gaps (Life Takes Visa, Think Small).

Or you are coming from so far away with bizarre humour or cultural irreverence that it grabs your full attention (FOX — “Stay Tuned” or Denny's “The Diner is Defiantly Different”).

Many of the juiciest examples we highlighted earlier break at least one of those “Golden Rules” to marvellous effect.

“Good things come to those who wait” — 8 words, more of a larger poetic concept, yet undeniably ownable to Guinness stout because it perfectly plays into their premium, patient craft brew persona.

And what nutball came up with “Shave Time. Shave Money” for Dollar Shave Club? That punny, quirky tagline hits all the right swagger notes for their disruptive brand while breaking plenty of “rules” along the way.

It has nothing to do with their products or benefits. And yet it does so much more — drips with personality, makes you smirk, distils their contrarian positioning in a few words, and is infinitely talkable/mashable/meme-able.

So, while there are no arguing guidelines that make strategic sense, feel free to rip them up occasionally to plunge your brand into something raw, memorable, and, yes — even flat-out weird. If authentically taps into your brand heart AND sticks in the human heart/mind in that undeniable way.

As long as it smacks of your core truths, a little-spirited rebellion can be freaking brilliant tagline kung-fu.

The Final Word: May the Best Tagline Win

By now, we've crammed a ton of tasty tagline theory and insights into our brains. But if there's one guiding light to burn brightest after this journey, it's that a great tagline has to:

1. Feel authentic, undeniably “you” as a brand
2. Burn itself into memory through creativity and resonance
3. Play by conventions or break them with an inspired purpose

Because at the end of the day, a tagline's main job is to be an unforgettable rallying cry for your company's entire mystique. It's the linguistic embodiment of your brand's heart and resonance code.

So whether you stick to the textbook rules or veer into deliciously uncharted territory, the most important thing is that your tagline crystallises your brand's deepest essence in a way that sparks real feelings and connections with audiences.

Because when you nail that elusive blend of sticking power and true-to-self expression? That's when you create the classic tagline that becomes a cultural catchphrase and calling card, generation after generation.

It becomes the inescapable refrain that defines your brand's legacy and personality in the hearts and minds of millions. Finding those perfect handful of words isn't just witty marketing — it's the challenge that makes brand legends.

Tag, You're It: 7 FAQs on Creating a Legendary Tagline

To ensure you're locked and loaded with all the tagline ammo you need, let's rapid-fire through a few parting FAQs:

The Tagline Gauntlet Has Been Thrown

Well, word ninja, I've emptied my utility belt of tagline tactics, examples, and branding rambunctiousness. Where you wield these powers is up to you!

Will you travel down the well-worn road of pithy benefit statements and conventional wisdom? Or blaze a new trail into strangely wondrous and unconventional tagline territory?

Either way, the marketing force of a legendary slogan is yours to craft and unleash upon the world. So pick up that pen and get cracking!

The next “Just Do It”, “Think Small”, or “The Uncola” is just waiting to be liberated from your brilliant brain meats. Give us something unforgettable that scorches its footprint on the cultural psyche forever.

Because the most significant brands of tomorrow? They'll be the ones with extraordinary taglines leading the charge. Get scribbling and make us remember yours!

The post 25+ Best Tagline Examples: The Power of a Punchy Tagline is by Stuart Crawford and appeared first on Inkbot Design.