Compare then contrast
Death metal bands have a weird thing for spiky logos.
It looks like the spikier and the most-difficult-to-decipher the logo, the better.
There are thousands of death metal bands out there with spiky and exceptionally unreadable logos.
For example, see this poster from 2005 for Bay Area Death Fest 2 and you'll understand what I mean.
Among all the chaotic madness of spiky logos that are virtually undistinguishable there's one that stands out.
Party Cannon.
And the Party Cannon logo stands out because, ironically, it's the only subversive logo.
It's subversive because it defies all your typical death metal clichés.
Instead of spiky it's fun.
Instead of black it's colorful.
Instead of Satan-inspired it's kinda childish and has Toys "R" Us vibes.
Which makes sense. After all Party Cannon is a Scottish band that describes themselves as "cute boys who like weird music". And they call their genre "death metal / party slam”.
You see, the human brain is wired to compare when valuing things. Consciously or unconsciously.
Humans aren't programmed to value things in isolation.
We need an anchor to compare and judge if a product, a service or even a band is good or bad. Or expensive or cheap. Or worth listening to or not worth listening to.
Which is why a copywriter's job is to reframe or reaffirm thoughts about your brand in people's minds.
And the most impactful way of doing this is to create value by carefully comparing and then contrasting the value of your product or brand with an alternative (an anchor).
Because if you don’t show consumers an anchor, their brains will look for one anyway. Party Cannon gets this.
㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡㋡
》”Dangerous” Ideas”
1/ Compare and contrast with a bad alternative.
This Sentry dog collar print ad from 1967 is a good example.
1.Use specific product facts you can communicate numerically ⇝ “Last summer, 2,000,000 dogs wore Sentry Collars.”
2.Compare your product with a bad alternative ⇝ “Instead of fleas.”
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7aad9010-d866-4be3-bc7b-9f0eec6787cf_427x554.png)
2/ Compare and contrast attitudes, feelings and perspectives.
Voters in my home country (Portugal) went to the polls on 10 March 2024. Iniciativa Liberal (IL) is the liberal party of Portugal. Contrary to most Portuguese political parties who have been around for over 50, 40 or 30 years, IL was founded in 2017.
In a country where most Political parties are left-wing parties, IL is the only right-wing Portuguese political party openly advocating for free markets and for more economic, political, and social liberty policies.
IL has been consistently growing since 2017. Before these elections IL was the 4th strongest political force and aiming to win market share and become the 3rd strongest political force.
The 5th strongest political force was Bloco de Esquerda (BE). BE is a far left populist and socialist party. And they’ve been around since 1999.
Both parties were competing for young votes. So in this 2024 election BE started running billboards around the country that said, “Fazer o que nunca foi feito”, which translated means “To do what has never been done before” in topics like Housing, Healthcare and Wage inequality.
So during the campaign IL started placing counter attack billboards right next to BE’s billboards using contrast. The billboards read, “Fazer o que já foi feito em países liberais (e funciona)” which translated means “To do what has already been done (And works) in economically-free countries” in topics like Housing, Healthcare and Wage inequality.
3/ Compare and frame your brand as a “good enough” option rather than perfect.
4/ Compare and contrast with the entire product category.
5/ Compare and contrast old and new.
This is the only Creative Samba story I’m sending you this month. So I’d like to wish you Merry Christmas and happy holidays 🎅 🎄. Thanks for reading my snackable emails.
Your pal,
🚀 Founder & Chief Copywriter: Teardwn ↬ “Hire me to give voltage to your website copy”
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