In branding and marketing, there marks a striking difference between a campaign and a true brand makeover. The new Meet Visa rollout is really a campaign. Even though the credit card giant pretends it’s the latter.
Visa is setting out to redefine itself, growing from its perception of being a credit card company to something larger. It says, “That name you see on everything is actually more like a signature. It’s a network working for everyone.”
Along with the set of ads is a new logo of sorts, which is really just an update of the old one. Just a brighter blue and minus the bars we’re accustomed to seeing.
Meet Visa isn’t really new
Meet Visa sets the stage for it presenting the brand as a tech company, right along with Google, Microsoft and all those phone providers that position themselves the same way. Being more important is its strategy.
But in truth it doesn’t change much.
In fact, it’s what I call being half-pregnant. Visa isn’t really going all the way. It’s taking a baby step with something that just presents product benefits.
In fact, the logo still comes with the same theme of “everywhere you want to be.” Only marketing experts will recognize the difference in the logo. In fact, the campaign’s slogan “A network working for everyone” is just that. A campaign slogan.
It only intends to highlight Visa’s technology of B2B payments, cryptocurrency, fine tech solutions, remittances and other things. Meet Visa will eventually disappear.
What was all that for?
A slogan vs a theme
People often get a slogan or a theme confused, thinking they are the same thing. A slogan is simply a (usually catchy) phrase that presents a campaign’s main point. A theme defines the brand. You want them working together. The brand theme controls everything. All you do – from marketing to operations to R&D – must flow from that theme.
In Visa’s case, they do work together. “Everywhere you want to be” means having “a network working for everyone.”
But here’s the problem. Where’s the customer in this? It’s all about Visa and nothing about who Visa customers are when they use the brand. The money and time spent on Meet Visa just says Visa owns a network. That’s it.
What Visa could have done
If Visa truly wanted to be known as a network then it should have really completed a rebrand. It’s holding onto sacred cows by thinking audiences will believe a change has taken place when, in reality, nothing has.
This is inside-out thinking. Which is why there’s so much marketing waste in our industry. Without being fully pregnant, Visa has not signified that a change has taken place. It won’t get noticed.
Meet Visa? We already have.