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"Climb out"? Of what?
The Slovenian Tourist Board has released its much anticipated new commercial for CNN. At a cost of 780,000 euros, it is the country’s flagship promotional project. It’s scheduled to air five times a day on CNN Europe in the early summer months and then again in the fall.
The video is beautifully done and I tip my hat to everyone involved, with the exception of those responsible for the awkward slogan: "A diversity to discover." The original (and superior) slogan — "the perfect getaway" — was rejected at the last minute out of concern that foreigners would interpret the word "getaway" in the criminal sense. (As in: After you’ve robbed a bank and killed your hostages, come to Slovenia: The perfect getaway!) I don’t think many people would have actually made that association, but it was nice to see so much thought going into the project.
Unfortunately, the creators ran out of time to think about things for much longer, so a silly, subpar slogan is now in the final cut.
Some brief thoughts on the slogan "A diversity to discover":
1) It’s usually good to avoid the passive voice, especially when trying to get someone’s attention. I couldn’t understand "a diversity to discover" when I first saw it. I still don’t, even after thinking about it. If you make the slogan active, though, you get a good sense of how odd it is. "Slovenia: Discover a diversity." ???
2) The word "diversity" itself is problematic, in that it’s mostly used in a biological sense — to talk about different species or to talk about different races. It usually pops up in equal rights campaigns (like this EU one) and has become synonymous with terms like "multiculturalism." As a result, it also has a lot of political baggage attached to it. In short, if someone talked to me about Slovenia’s "rich diversity" I would assume they meant it was filled with foreigners of all races, creeds and colors. That’s probably not what the commercial wanted to say. (And it’s not exactly applicable for Slovenia anyway.)
3) This country is fighting a long, hard, seemingly endless battle for recognition within Europe and the world, so I applaud what this commercial is trying to do. It’s fighting the good fight. But I can also say that stuffy slogans announcing that "there’s a lot of different stuff here!" won’t make much of an impression. Slovenia’s obscurity is unfortunate on one hand, but it’s also an advantage: this country has the freedom to present any image it wants to the outside world. Sadly, the only thing this slogan says is that Slovenia is too boring to say anything special about itself.
4) "Climb out" makes absolutely no sense in the context that it’s used.
5) There’s a very good reason why the line "a diversity to discover" has, according to Google, never been recorded, ever. (Except for in this commercial)
Final thoughts: A while back, Croatia ran some ads on CNN. Their slogan was: "The Mediterranean as it once was." I thought it was brilliant. The shots were beautiful and the message was crystal clear: Other countries may have a coastline like us, but they’ve overdeveloped and fucked it up — so come on down and enjoy the unspoiled original.
It was a great message, and it quickly gave you a compelling reason why you should see Croatia. Slovenia’s commercial, while aesthetically pleasing, fails to provide any reason about what makes Slovenia special or why someone should bother coming here. The only hope is that the pretty pictures will be enough of an enticement.
Here’s hoping it works.
–> You can watch the video here.
(Thanks Alex!)
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The last link doesn’t get you to the video. But the link in the second paragraph does, and it is a really nicely made video. It was a touch long, and could use a better ending. The guy’s hand randomly showing up is creepy.
Yikes. Fixed it — thanks. From what I understand, they won’t air the whole thing but rather various snippets.
Aesthetically pleasing but totally dissapointing in every other way.
Climb out, fly free etc. don’t make any sense to me.
If this is supposed to be a TV ad it’s 3min 30s too long…
Walk away
Another great entry!
You can see the shorther versions of the commercial here:
www.slovenia-tourism.si/?_ctg_video=0
The video gets better towards the end, it is very nicely done, it might even win some awards. But is seems to me as if its target population are other people in advertising and not your regular Joe. I mean climbing the St.George church in Piran? OK, it looks cool, but I doubt it will attract any climbers. What in this video tells some tourist what can he/she do in Slovenia? Ride horses? See the beatiful baroque Ljubljana facades? What age group is this video targeting? 70-year-olds? I totally agree with what Michael and others have said about this. A good attempt but I have a funny feeling that the first version would have fared much better. But it was too extravagant for the narrow minds in power today.
i did a quick google search. the phrase “your perfect getaway” in the first 50 pages i scanned through is used exclusively in the tourist sense. and, none of them is about the slovene ad. if you could acusse the former message in the ad of anything, it could only be that it’s not even remotely original in any sense, but then, better that than to have an ad that makes little to no sense.personaly, i just couldn’t believe it when i heard our foreign minister (sigh) saying something along the lines of this on the news: “well, the message of the ad is, shall we say, inapropriate, in the sense that it might, um, have bad conotations for a, well, native speaker, that is, meaning, it could also mean a prison getaway, you see.” i’m sorry mister foreign minister, but that’s just a load of crap. obviously he or his advisor who whispered in his ear, has no sense of the english language whatsoever, and relies on dictionary entries for help. i wish people like that, with half a knowledge of english, would stay the hell out of the jobs of translators, who make a living out of their knowledge of the english language. the ironic thing is, the phrase, the way i understand it, is *supposed* to be reminiscent of a prison getaway: you live your drab cubicle life day in day out, and then, you get away from it all, like you would from a prison, to a tourist destination of your choice - any of the numerous google hits will do. or it could even be this slovania country you saw on cnn the other day.
I think It is extremely obvious what is meant by diversity. It doesn’t take a lot to understand, just watch the movie. It is a wonderful commercial. And It realy tells the World about the essence of Slovenia. And there’s no need for all stupid cones to understand it.
Some excellent points you made here Michael, esp. no. 3. I suppose it’s more the fault of the client than the advertiser, but these sort of general images, slogans etc belong in the 80’s, although the current slogan would’ve been embarassing even then. My view is that Slovenia needs an integrated promotional campaign that offers concrete ideas on what the country has to offer, while the messages should be tailored to suit a handful of well-defined target groups - not some vague general audience that is supposed to be seduced by images of lake Bled… I don’t think a CNN campaign is a bad idea in itself, but I certainly hope it forms only part of a wider communication strategy. Finally, I don’t quite share your view on the Croatian campaign - the slogan is good, but the rest is just a relatively bad mixture of dated images.
It’s bad. This commercial ad doesn’t really attract the viewer to visit Slovenia. It’s a lot of nothing. I got the feeling that it is meant for only one thing - boosting the national ego and wasting taxpayers money.
IMHO it would be better if they just showed a map of Slovenia for 4 minutes with the slogan “Slovenia is not Slovakia”. Now, that would be a commercial!
And why for Christ’s sake don’t they include an INTERNET LINK like www.slovenia-tourism.si Hello???
Um well, I don’t really like it. I guess we really know how to make things complicated around here. I have a simple rule: if a commercial makes a tough guy cry, then it’s gonna be a success! ;)As far as "getaway" is concerned — here’s what my dear friend Webster has to say about it:One entry found for getaway.Main Entry: get·awayPronunciation: ‘ge-t&-"wAFunction: noun1 : an act or instance of getting away: as a : ESCAPE b : START2 : a place suitable for a vacation3 : a vacation especially of brief duration Well well…
@Poulette: Duh! “Slovenia” and “communication strategy” are mutually exclusively terms!
@abaris: URL link. But of course! That was a huge oversight…
I rather liked it :o) Esp. the music…who are the singers? Katice?
I agree with the opinion that this ad is more suitable for boosting national ego than inviting tourists. It reminds me of the ad campaign from the 80’s with a slogan “Slovenija, moja dežela” (Slovenia, my country). I really do not see a good reason for tourists to visit after seeing this ad. Maybe to see the “snails” (Proteus anguinus) or to climb a church? Not.
@ abaris: There is a link in the video, right at the end where they show the flag (www.slovenia.info).
Well, do you know any other place where you can climb churches, hehe? At least spiderman is already packing…
Slovenia: The Other Slovakia
or
Slovenia: Come see Peaks other than Natalja Verboten
would have made decent substitutes
I agree with Peter Zrinski, very nicely done. But maybe too specific. Who the heck cares about Globokar (or ski jumping or olympic medal in sailing or klopotec and vine (-yards)…. And those who care, they already know Slovenia. Music is beautiful. I wonder too from which group is it? I hope someone will answer.
@ Nikolaj: Who the heck cares about… I’d say a good ad includes unknown things that aim at coaxing the viewer to discover them. He then probably thinks: "klopo- wtf?!" or something similar, and decides to consult Wikipedia, or, even better, go to Slovenia straight away. Tourists do tend to love attaining special knowledge about the destinations they are spending their money on / in. But yes: the music is beautiful. An old song from Prekmurje. And the video is lovely, diversity being a good concept (getaway is not bad either, it is still implied in the video). If we imagine a potential visitor having a look at the map of Europe (Slo-… a, here it is!) and discovering how small it really is - he may well need the message about its diversity, his mind in most cases being used to different dimensions of this thing people call country. But I don’t understand about "climb out" either: wtf?!
Just beautiful
But I don’t understand about "climb out" either: wtf?! Climb out of your mundane, Western lives? Who knows. ["Slovenia: discover good fruit juice." would work for me. Mhm.]
The slogan will indeed boost gay tourism - "diversity" in context of "travel" is often used in gay culture. The governmental queer lobby has its agenda. Has coyones.
Heavens, it just struck me: climb out == come out!!! The puzzle is solved. To reinforce my hypothesis: here.
I rather liked the old “Slovenija, moja dežela” spots–the music was catchy, and the ending, with a shot of a country road and a cluster of road signs saying “Welcome” in different languages, was kinda nice too. Though one of the “typical” Slovenes featured in them was for some reason wearing what looked like a Austro-Hungarian Navy admiral’s uniform, with matching 19th century mustache–I never quite got that.
OK, I agree with Paulette, I hope this video is just a small part of a broader communication strategy, which is very well prepared, planned and most important tested on its target groups. BTW, is this guy skiing on the grass in the vineyard???
The video is great and has some awesome pics, but the slogan is way too easy to forget. I’ve already forgotten it.
I don’t dislike it but I’m not exactly crazy about it either. From what I understand they used old shots and glued them together. I think it’d be much better to make a bunch of ids directly for the occasion, something that’d be part of a pre-written script. I think what really gets the attention of an average commerical watcher interesting in travel is a combo of the sea followed directly by a fly-over of the Alps. I dunno… it could have been much worse than it is, I’ll say that much. The team who put this together definitely did a good job given the footage they had available.
I really have to comment on that. I found this site by chance and didn’t really know what it was. First I thought - wow, how many foreigners talking about Slovenia. Then - oh, but they are all so critical. And then I understood - they are Slovenians, bashing themselves. And I felt as I was home again. Some people made a video so that other 2 milion could complain about it - what’s new? We are small, we complain about that (and many other things) and we talk how very unimportant we are - we just do it in english now. And a few words about the video - I liked it. It could be better - like all things. But I thought images were very appealing and sometimes I thought - wow, we have that in Slovenia.
I’ve read somewhere that the song from Prekmurje is performed by Katice.