The other day, my wife stumbled upon this article about The Tea Party (AKA Teabaggers). A party member, curious why people laugh in his face after he identifies himself as a Teabagger, decides to Google the term. And he discovers that the term has an embarrassing sexual meaning.
This article is not about politics. It’s about knowing what your brand says to others.
Before reading this article, I did not know that some people actually called themselves Teabaggers. At least not in the political sense. I’d heard the term only from Democrats and smartass TV and radio commentators. I never saw anyone standing on top of a mountain, proclaiming I am a teabagger! (That’s one hell of an image though). And so, I always thought that the term was derogatory. I’ve always been one of those who laughed internally whenever he heard the term.
This is NOT what came up in the guy’s Google search!
But apparently there are people who have gone around proclaiming themselves Teabaggers with an intense passion and were left wondering why people think that their cause is some big joke. Their message wasn’t the problem. Their delivery wasn’t the problem. The problem was their identification. Their brand name. If, in the early stages of this movement, someone had taken the time to search the term in Google, maybe the party wouldn’t have embraced this term. Maybe their message would spread more easily (to, you know, people in their early 20′s who laugh at teabagger).
We live in a superficial world. You hear the term “Don’t judge a book by its cover” because people do judge books by their covers. And their titles.
Sure, when you get past the name and listen to what they have to say, the Teabaggers might have a good message. But you’re too busy chuckling to listen. And the buck stops there.
And so I think you have to ask yourself, Is some minute detail acting as a big deterrent to your brand and your message? Do you need to modify your brand?
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