The other day I saw a removals van that said:

Coals* to Newcastle
                                           *A nice new coal grey sofa that is

Cue furious and unstoppable eye-rolling.

This kind of writing is part of a trend that’s been bubbling away in branding for some time now. A brand voice trend that can be best summed up by one phrase: ‘a smile in the mind’.

 

What, and – for the love of God – why?

‘A smile in the mind’ is an emotional limbo state many brands want to induce in their audience. A level of joy so insipid, it doesn’t even make it to ‘a smile on the face’. Instead it’s a smile that rumbles somewhere deep within. Like nausea, but for smiling.

How did such an unappealing concept become a touchstone of modern branding?

We blame innocent.

You see, innocent bowled onto the scene in the 2000s, and brought with it a delightfully perky, quirky brand voice. It said things like this:

And this

And this

Adorable.

But then every brand on God’s green earth decided it wanted a slice of the ‘smile in the mind’ pie. Soon banks were saying…

And sausages were saying…

… until everyone from insurers to airlines, hotels to haircare brands, were trying to crowbar their way into our hearts with their cheerful, chummy, ‘relatable’ content.

 

The result? Lots of very bad advertising.

The trouble is, this ‘let’s be mates’ writing style is very hard to pull off.

Why? Well for starters, because you are a corporation. No one wants to be your mate. The average person is about as inclined to laugh at your ‘irreverent wit’ as they are to welcome a punch in the face.

So unless you can get the tone pitch-perfect, you end up with work that’s cloying, annoying, and not nearly as clever as it thinks it is.

The second problem with ‘smile in the mind’? It’s worn out.

Innocent’s voice worked because it was original – people hadn’t heard a brand talk like that before. It was a nice surprise – and surprise sells.

But as company after company climbed on the ‘smile in the mind’ bandwagon, each one was less surprising than the one before.

Now, it seems like we’re swimming in a sea of same-same brands all desperately trying to tickle our ribs. And – like a needy ex who just can’t let it go – the harder they try, the less we care.

 

So, what’s the alternative?

LITERALLY ANYTHING.

How about being surly, like Chrunchits?

 

Or silly, like Le Puzz?

Or confrontational, like Nike?

The moral of the story is: WE HAVE OPTIONS.

And almost any of those options would be better than what we’re all still doggedly doing right now.

Which is why it’s time to move on, to bid a churlish farewell to ‘a smile in the mind’, and embrace the vast array of other ways a brand can show up and show off in the world.