Branding Made Simple

One of my favorite brands is General Electric, or GE. Established in 1878 as the tiny Edison Electric Light Company, it is now a vast, multi-billion dollar conglomerate. It employs 295,000 people, give or take, who speak dozens of languages and who work in over 170 countries. It once had more than eighty business units although they’ve now streamlined, through mergers and divesture, down to eleven. But those remaining eleven are massive companies in their own right. GE is a big player in power, energy, lighting, healthcare, financial services, aviation, and much more. It is an enormously complex machine yet it is known for being as agile and innovative as a millennial’s startup. With all the difficulties of making the whole thing go, they’re still able to express their brand in three simple words, “Imagination at work.” Now, my admiration for GE was already well-developed when they had a six-word brand promise, “We bring good things to life.” Think of it. They already had a beautifully simple and efficient brand promise that, in almost miraculous fashion, managed to express what every worker in every business unit was about. And what did they do? They took the time and effort to make it even simpler, going from six words down to three. Why? Read more.