"Make America Great Again!"Or: The Brand Strategist as Court Jester?

It exists: an organization that promotes the USA as a brand worldwide. Even now: "Brand USA"(https://www.thebrandusa.com/) is looking for more employees. At least for now. As a public-private partnership, the federal government provides half the funding of "Brand USA". The Musketeers—"Young men with smirking profile photos and scandalously thin curriculum vitae […] the shock troops of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)" (Quinn Slobodian in: New York Review of Books, February 15, 2025)—have yet to appear at "Brand USA" in Washington, D.C., to expose and reduce "waste, abuse, and inefficiency" ("Brand USA"’s budget for 2025: $250 million).

The immediate future of "Brand USA" as an organization is not the issue here. May it and its employees survive Trump’s "war on Washington bureaucracy" relatively unscathed.

Far more important: this specific case sheds light on the concept and technique of nation branding in general. Fundamentally, the close connection between brand and offering is one of the undisputed success factors in branding. So how does the "Ugly American" (the current brand experience with Trump, Vance, Hegseth, Kennedy, and other illustrious members of Team Trump suggests this positioning) fit with the attempt to present the USA as welcoming, partnership-oriented, and inclusive (as the "Brand USA" website suggests)? Doesn't this expose a colossal credibility gap between the brand promises of the "Board of Directors USA" and the "Marketing Department USA"? Classical branding techniques would consider this gap unbridgeable and thus deem the branding process hopeless.

Should the "CMO" (here: the President and CEO of "Brand USA") resign given the hopelessness of his mission? So far, it doesn’t seem that way.

Again, this specific case merely serves as an occasion to describe and discuss the challenges of nation branding in broader terms. Conceptually, nation branding assumes that the nation (as the overarching entity) and the brand (as the marketed offering or product) need not be related. The aim is not to turn the nation into a brand. "Brand USA" interestingly does not even attempt to define the USA as a brand. Instead, its much more modest goal is to promote the USA as a travel destination in a positive light. The latter has nothing to do with the image of the USA as communicated by its leadership and made tangible by government actions.

Thus, the image delivered of the "Ugly American" and the image desired of the USA as "friendly, welcoming, supportive, and inspiring" can coexist. Partners can be alienated, insulted, blackmailed, or threatened while their citizens are courted. Poverty and misery, violence, and conflict do not disrupt the construction of the USA as a vacation paradise. Some are warmly invited as tourists, while others are brutally kicked out as unwanted human beings. Entry processes can be made "customer-friendly" for some while others are forcibly, illegally, and inhumanely repatriated, deported, expelled, or removed—euphemisms bordering on Orwellian Newspeak.

This leads to an initial conclusion: the concept of “brand development” has no place in the context of nations and nation-states. Even the doyen of nation branding now openly and admirably acknowledges the shortcomings of the concept, asking: “Has it all been a big misunderstanding?” (Simon Anholt in: Place Branding and Public Diplomacy (2024) 20: 4–69). A more moderate judgment might be that Nation Branding is a misnomer. However, it is a highly lucrative misnomer. An entire industry thrives on it. A growing academic discipline enjoys its success. The term’s appeal resonates strongly with political circles and the media, as it suggests professionalism and modernity.

Final Thought: Nation branding is here to stay (and grow). For brand strategists, this results in the opportunity to assume the role of the court jester (see: https://www.br.de/­mediathek/­podcast/­radiowissen/­der-hofnarr-legende-­und-wahrheit-1/1803710). My modest proposal: we should embrace this role in all its complexity and ambivalence—not just as highly talented entertainers with limited, low status. We should use our gained jester's freedom to speak uncomfortable truths. For example: "This USA, Donald, is truly unmarketable." However, we cannot transform obvious foolishness (marketing today’s USA as a vacation paradise) into deeper wisdom—and only then could we, as nation branders, seriously claim the status of the modern court jester.