There is no such thing as a perfect name. Brand and product names are hugely impacted by the companies and brands that launch them. So a name that works for one brand in one industry may be a horrible fit for another brand in another category.
For example, people loved the iPod when launched by Apple in 2001. But many of those same people bashed the brand for naming their tablet iPad. iPod in and of itself isn’t necessarily a fantastic name, but wrapped in the totality of the Apple brand it works. Consider the same product name being launched by Dell, HP or Toshiba and suddenly the iPod, iPad and iPhone don’t sound as cool.
So what makes a good name?
It starts with better insights
I believe the path to smarter solutions begins with better insights. This applies to naming brands and products as well. It helps to know a little about the company, the products, the audiences who will use the product and the people who will purchase it (especially in the case of naming products for kids), the category, channel, product tier, etc.
When naming a fruit snack for Kellogg’s a few years back, the brief said the product would be a combination of chewy fruit flavor kids would love plus an outer coating of yogurt moms would like. We had to create a name that would appeal to moms and kids as young as three years old. Young kids can’t pronounce complex words or sounds, so our solution, Yogos, was simple enough for young kids to say while communicating a bigger story to moms.
Fit versus “like”
Like most naming agencies, we use a combination of filters to narrow broad lists of words and find viable names that fit. The key here is fit, versus names people “like”. Many people have a natural aversion for new things, including new product and brand names. So if you only pursue names people “like”, you can quickly find yourself painted into a corner with a name that sounds familiar, isn’t the least differentiating and may not even be available for trademark. But people will like it.
In the following, I’ll break down the seven filters we use to use to help understand whether the names you’re considering will fit the challenge:
Fit to organization
Fit to brand
Fit to the category
Fit to product
Fit to consumer
Visual fit
Fit to be owned
Filter for success
1) Fit to organization: Does the name match the character, positioning, aspirations and voice of the organization? When naming a company, we want to consider where the enterprise is headed, the industry they’re in and how we can help them stand out.
In naming a quick serve restaurant that wanted to stand out while still communicating the type of cuisine they served, we launched with the name Currito and followed with a tag line of “Burritos Without Borders” to help draw people in to a menu that include Bangkok, Mediterranean and Summer burritos.
2) Fit to brand: When naming a product within a brand we have to ask if the names we’re considering match the brand. Should they sound like a sister product to existing collections, or should they sound like a stand-alone?
For Apple, once Steve Jobs accepted the iPod construct, it made sense to continue with iPhone and iPad in the lineup. But not everything in the Apple family carries the i____ construct as evidenced by the Apple collections (Apple Watch, Apple TV) and the venerable Macintosh collections (MacBook, Mac Mini). Regardless, it’s hard to miss the connections back to the brand.
Try to find the consistency in the Dell portfolio that sports laptops including the Inspiron, XPS, Alienware and Chromebook. This starts to look suspiciously like an “I just want a cool name” brand architecture. Not horrible, but it’s harder to discern good versus bad names for Dell.
3) Fit to the category: Does the name sound like it naturally fits in the neighborhood? This can be good and bad. Sometimes the neighborhood needs a good shakeup. I like to ask my clients if they want to be a PC or an Apple in a PC world. It’s not so much that one approach is better than the other. But understanding how the brand wants to position themselves and/or their products can carry significant influence in which direction the names go.
At the time of its launch, the BlackBerry was revolutionary partly because the industry was bloated with PocketPCs and a fascination with numbers, including the Samsung 1710, Dell Axim x50 and Siemens SX56, to name just a few.
It’s difficult to find consumers who know and love their numbered products outside of a precious few industries. BMW gets away with it partly because they group their products by tier (300, 500, 700 series), Lexus tries hard, but Infiniti just doesn’t. Interestingly, Porsche stepped away from the numbers game a few years ago and began giving their models unique names. This approach wouldn’t have been a big deal in many categories, but in high-end automobiles it made a difference.
4) Fit to product: Good names match the products or services they promote. The auto industry uses evocative names to help consumers get into the head space of the automobile: Muscle cars get beefy names like Charger and Challenger; SUVs get outdoors with Yukon, Pathfinder and XTerra; while family vehicles evoke the journey with Odyssey, Quest and Voyager.
Many brand managers think this filter means they need a descriptive name. Descriptive names are good because they need very little support to help people understand what they are. But they can also blend in with everything around them and get lost in the mix. BlackBerry fit the product AND made a huge impact on the category.
5) Fit to consumer: Is the name something the target audiences would want to say out loud in a conversation with their friends? Some names look good on paper, but you have to say them out loud and use them in a sentence with words normal people use. These filters should change depending on the audience.
I mentioned the Yogos example earlier, where names had to be simple enough for young children to say. By contrast, when creating liquor names, we use a bar call filter. Because the audiences need to be able to confidently yell out the drink name in a crowded bar. Calling out for a Red Stag for a cherry-infused bourbon is a lot better than screaming ChaCha Cherrylicious. The second option just doesn’t fit the audience, or the bar.
6) Visual fit: Almost every designer on the planet will say shorter names are better for the simple reason that the name can be bigger on packaging. That’s not to say there isn’t a place for longer names, but you need to consider that many consumers, especially Americans, tend to abbreviate long names: Federal Express became FedEx; International House of Pancakes became IHop; Government Employees Insurance Company became GEICO. The list is long. Your name should probably be short.
7) Fit to be owned: Beyond just being available for trademark, can the name be owned in the marketplace? This one gets tricky because uniqueness is tough to sell in some organizations. But uniqueness needs to be managed.
Companies like P&G, Unilever and Colgate tend to spend most of their marketing capital on the master brand name and much less on sub-brands and versions. Tide, Cascade, Dawn and Bounty are evocative, unique names that stand out in the marketplace. Tide Plus Coldwater Clean is purposefully descriptive so consumers can shop quickly and easily at shelf. The brand just doesn’t have to work as hard to get the versioning information out there.
This also helps fight against a portfolio of random “cool” names that don’t hold together. As seen in the Dell example, collections of unique names can lead to confusion for consumers. So, while we always want names to stand apart in the market, we also recommend having a nomenclature strategy that can help manage the mayhem.
There are dozens of ways to filter and sort for good names. As a naming agency, we look for tools that can help us develop successful names for our clients on a regular basis and, just as importantly, weed out the options that won’t work. If you’re looking for naming help, let’s talk. If you’re going it alone, I hope these filters help you reach success.