Seoul's terrible new slogan Part 2

The Korea Times

The Korea Times

Opinion

Sun, December 3, 2023 | 04:16

Editorial

Seoul's terrible new slogan Part 2

Posted : 2023-08-30 17:13

Updated : 2023-08-30 17:18

'Find Your Seoul' can be alternative to banal slogan

By John Burton

In 2015, I wrote a column for the Korea Times that was headlined, "Seoul's terrible new slogan," which criticized the selection of "I.Seoul.U" as the city's new brand.

It was one of the most commented-upon columns I ever wrote and as I re-read it now, it repeats almost verbatim my thoughts about the new slogan and logo that Seoul has just launched: "Seoul, my soul."

My objection to "I.Seoul,U" was that it didn't make much sense to an international audience. It had traces of Konglish. The two final alternative slogans weren't any better: "SEOULing" and "Seoulmate."

This time around what I object to is that "Seoul, my soul" is banal and insipid in its appeal and is based on the rather tired premise of playing on the word "soul" and the city's name. The city government claims that it depicts Seoul as a city of warmth, freedom and passion that can fill the soul. As for the logo, it is at least colorful and eye-catching, although perhaps also a bit confusing.

The three runner-up slogans: "Seoul for you," "Amazing Seoul," and "Make it happen, Seoul" also lack excitement and energy and amount to cliches.

The new slogan's vagueness falls short of what Mayor Oh Se-hoon wanted to achieve when he launched the initiative last year, when he stated that "we need a slogan to convey that [Seoul] is globally significant."

It doesn't really capture the fact that Seoul has become a global cultural mecca or match Mayor Oh's quest to make it one of the world's top five cities. Seoul probably now has the most distinctive profile of any city in Asia, being a primary source of pop culture, including K-Pop bands, TV soap operas and films. I do not see a hint of Seoul's glamor and high-tech style in the new branding exercise.

While the slogans offered in 2015 may have been edgy, this time the preference was more conservative. It returns us to the days of the early 2000s when the city's slogan was "Hi! Seoul." Perhaps its successor, "Soul of Asia," came closest to conveying the city's dynamism and status, although it was soon replaced by the more awkward, "Infinitely yours, Seoul." Then came the somewhat baffling "SEOUL. MY [...]," where you were supposed to fill in your own description of the city. This set the stage for "I.SEOUL.U" which was also meant to suggest different meanings for those living and visiting the city.

Selecting a catchy slogan is difficult. The gold standards when it comes to branding for cities have been "I Love (heart) New York" and "Hong Kong: Asia's World City." Both summed up in a few words the essence of the city's appeal and were the products of advertising and public relations agencies that had long experience in these matters and subjected their ideas to focus group testing.

Seoul has taken a different approach, supposedly relying on crowd-sourcing to come up with new slogan ideas, which puts the concept of "the wisdom of crowds" to a severe test.

Relying less on the use of marketing agencies to produce branding slogans in favor of the public selecting them was partly a political ploy to win voter support by giving the people a sense of participation.

Part of the problem lies with the slogan selection process, which was similar to the one used in 2015. The public and local civil servants were asked to come up with keywords to describe Seoul, such as "dream" and "future." The keywords were then analyzed by "experts," who proposed the final slogans to be voted on by both Koreans and foreigners in an online survey. It would appear that in the end, it was the consultants who had the most say in determining the creation of the slogans, rather than the public.

It's too late to offer an alternative slogan, but my personal favorite is "Find Your Seoul," which was first suggested in 2015. It suggests a diversity of things to explore and do in the city, while it conveys a sense of personal gratification and satisfaction. It also plays on the word "soul" and the city's name, which seems to be a favorite trope. As an added bonus, it can incorporate the symbols of the heart (love), exclamation point (inspire) and smile (fun) used in the new logo.

Maybe next time.

John Burton (johnburtonft@yahoo.com), a former Korea correspondent for the Financial Times, is a Washington, D.C.-based journalist and consultant.