Business Naming Basics

Business naming can be a hazardous activity.

There are hundreds of examples of names that were screened and approved, only to find after investing in branding the name that to contain objectionable translations or obscure meanings that are derogatory. Chevy’s Nova in Brazil means impotent Another name, I forget which one, turned out to be related to a fifteenth-century demon who ravaged women.

So to help namers alleviate (not eradicate, just make the odds better) the problem, A service called www.Globalnaming.com was formed in 2010. Here you can enter a name candidate and the software will search it’s several databases of foreign slang and “dirty” words, thesauruses and dictionaries, and then indicate possible problems.

Very easy to navigate and to use. The deliverable is a pdf report.

One caveat: the name creation function on the site leaves much to be desired. In fact, I found it very limited and limiting.

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Business naming, when done “professionally”, is not a matter of days. Quite often there’s a six-month or more time range for brand name generation, approval and registration.

One reason for the length is that professionals (and usually their clients) know that the best and most unique corporate names come from the process of acquiring, developing, rearranging, combining, truncating and in other ways manipulating a myriad number of words, prefixes, suffixes, word roots, phonemes, expressions, clichés, idioms, descriptions, locations and symbols.

That’s a mouthful, isn’t it? And a lot of time and effort expended

It just indicates the lengths they go to in order to produce a really stunning brand name that meets all the client’s criteria, and still lives up to the professional’s standards.

Good business names come from long lists, hard work and inspiration..

Those in the naming business have learned two basic things about the creative process of naming.

First, they know that the longer the list of naming components and of name candidates, the more creative fodder there is to harvest. It provides more opportunities for cross fertilization. It doesn’t matter if most of the ideas on paper are unusable as a name because even the most ungainly phrase can trigger an inspiration.

Second, the more often a list is perused, the more likely more ideas will be generated that can be added to the mix. More ideas help form different perspectives and fresh insights. Quite often the really good names don’t show up until the third or fourth iteration.

Business naming takes time, but it’s worth it

If you’re planning to develop a great corporate name, I suggest you follow the steps below:

Anticipate at least a two months and an hour of your time every day to both administer and create lists of name candidates and potential naming components (suffixes, etc.).

Develop a set of criteria for naming the company.

Identify resources to help you in your quest for volumes of name ideas. There are many, even though some are elusive and out-of-the-box. They range from a common thesaurus to Internet lists such as bird names and paint colors.

Engage others in your organization, and/or your family and friends, to generate name candidates, spend time at the library, compile lists, and contribute during naming sessions.

Brain storm with your team to develop more candidates, but not to evaluate them.

Begin winnowing out the chaff, but do so one at a time as you ask yourself if the losers spark more ideas

Once the list gets down to 20-30, begin to measure them against your written criteria.

Have one more brainstorming session before making a final decision because at this point your team will have had time to “digest” all the fodder and perhaps a new, inspired candidate or two will emerge.

Check your final candidates for availability.

So as you can see, this amount of thoroughness and hard work will take time, but time well worth the taking if you are convinced that a company name is one of your most valuable assets.

Oh, yes, one way to make this process less stressful and less complicated is to hire a good naming company. Like Signature Strategies.

Tags: Name Development // 1 Comment »

Business naming can often settle into a rut.

You’ve exhausted your normal resources and nothing’s sparked. Time to try, as Monty Python used to say, “Something completely different”.

Here’s one idea: see if song titles (or film or show titles) could kick-start the process. Fortunately, there’s web-based resource that allows you to review thousands of song titles, over 150,000 to be approximate. The site is dbopm, short for Database of Popular Music, and you can reach it by clicking here.

Once there, click “Search the Database” on the left, then whichever media type – song, show, film you want – and search for the link that displays titles by year. Select a year and start browsing. There may or not be actual name candidates sitting there for the pickin’, but you never know. But just doing the exercise will stir up the creative juices.

For instance, under song title copyright date 1913, I found this title: Carancho on the first page. It’s a tango, but what if I were naming an auto repair shop? Right on, huh?

You can also search by a word you’d like to be included in a title. I selected “King’s” as a search term and came away with nine titles including King’s Favorite and King’s Horses, either of which might be a name candidate or idea-prompter.

Another thing about song titles: they cannot be protected under copyright laws, so it’s okay to use them.

Like a lot of resources, Internet-based and others, you may come away with no inspired name candidates, but the search itself will broaden your perspective and just might get you out of an ever-deepening rut.

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Naming a business after the owners is commonplace, particularly for service providers.

There are two main reasons people name their company’s after themselves – it’s easy and there’s an ego involved.

The name, particularly if it’s comprised of two or three partner’s names, like most law and accounting firms, is usually available and possibly trademarkable. And it takes very little creativity to name a business after oneself. What’s more, the business can be named quickly so the founders can get on with the important things. They probably spend more time picking office furniture than they do naming their business.

Ego is a little more complicated reason for the owner naming the business after themselves. Very seldom will the owner acknowledge that having a business named after oneself is an act of ego-stroking. Their response when asked usually has to do with the name having a “certain reputation in the field”. Then they might also allude to the fact that most professional service providers use the principal’s name. It’s, well, professional.

Little thought is given to an “exit plan”. Selling a business that’s named for someone else doesn’t appeal to other ego-driven professionals, nor do buyers see that they gain any equity by carrying on under someone else’s name.

There is a trend, even in the medical community, to do business under a name designed to evoke a positive feeling about the entity, and to differentiate on factors other than the founder’s reputation. I believe it’s healthy and beneficial to take the time and make the effort to name a professional service provider by a name that sets the organization, not the individuals, apart.

Oh, another group of professionals guilty of using founder names? Branding consultants.

Goodness gracious. Think they’d advise their clients to do the same?

Tags: Name Development // 2 Comments »

There are several letter combinations that are unusual for word beginnings. Unusual, but not so foreign that folks don’t know how to spell and pronounce the words in which those combinations normally appear. I call them bi-letters

So what are some of those bi-letters that can help you create unique names? First, they’re all consonants. Second, they’re not Anglo-derived. Here are those I’ve identified along with a common word using them.

Cz czar
Dh dharma
Dj Djakarta
Dw dwarf
Gh ghost
Gn gnarl
Kh khaki
Kl klieg
Pn pneumonia
Ps psychic
Pt ptarmigan
Rh rhythym
Ry rye

There are two approaches to using bi-letters as name beginnings.

First, go through your list of descriptor words you’ve already identified as appropriate to what you’re naming and look for those with the same sound as one of the bi-letters. Note that the first letter after the bi-letter should be a vowel. This is an example of deliberate misspelling to achieve uniqueness.

Second, just add a vowel and a consonant after a bi-letter to form a new, short word that could become a coined name, or the first syllable of potential name. This technique creates coined words that people can read and pronounce with confidence.

Whenever you come across bi-letters, put them in your naming aids notebook.

(Don’t have a naming aids notebook? If you’re planning to name more than one business, product, service, event or destination, I suggest your begin one now. If it’s a 3-hole notebook, you can go through these blogs and copy and print the tips I’ve provided. That would be a pretty good beginning.)

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Quite often an organization will want to change its name.

There are several valid reasons for changing your company’s name.

1) A name change might be sought because the company has outgrown their old name, that is the name has become irrelevant (Radio Shack).

2) The company’s reputation might have been sullied to the point no salvation (Enron).

3) Perhaps the name itself has taken on an undesired life of its own (Aids).

4) Legal conflicts with Trademark holders that dictate changing the name.

5) Mergers and acquisitions where confusing or conflicting situations arise either in the marketplace or internally.

6) A “nickname” based upon the original name becomes so dominant the company is practically forced to officially adopt the nickname (IBM, FedEx).

There are probably other reasons, but these six predominate.

The management mind-set is different in each of these situations.

But let’s just concentrate on the first situation: an outmoded name. In 1), management is perhaps reluctant if not conflicted about making a change. They see equity in the name. They don’t want to confuse customers. This may also apply to managements in the 4) and 5) situations, but probably not to the same extent.

What often happens is that management believes they must “transition” from the old name to the new, that they should retain part of their old name, or at least associate with it in some way. The outcome is usually a weak and often confusing name that neither retains old, desirable associations, nor defines a new “role” for the organization.

By not being open to a name that might signify new directions, new markets, new opportunities, they limit the potential of a new name that’s more relevant to the company’s vision and mission. So Radio Shack becomes The Shack.

Here in Colorado there was a “home for wayward boys” called Colorado Boys Ranch. As it evolved, it catered to a nationwide clientele of boys and girls, and became much more “high-tech” than a ranch. To “transition”, they used the initials CBR coupled with a generic phrase that was much too abstract to mean anything. Now, except for long-time donors who still call it Colorado Boys Ranch, there is no identity for this fine organization.

By attempting to hold on to old equity and placate stakeholders, yet reflect what the organization has become, managements inhibit and restrict creativity and the chance of adopting a name with gusto.

You can’t have it both ways.

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I’ve not been a raving fan of completely invented words as names for products or companies.
However, I do find some forms of coined names desirable.

Those are names which start from a root word that is relevant to the product, service or business being named. For instance, if you’re marketing a new telephone device, I can advocate a name using the root, “phone” or “fone”.

The reason, as I’ve stated previously, is that people don’t like new words. They are comfortable with the familiar. So to make a name with a familiar root and with some coined “flair” to go with it produces comfort, easy pronunciation and meaning almost instantly.

It’s providing the flair that makes the name unique, and possibly trademarkable.

Here’s another way to create that flair.

Start with a vowel-ending root

Let’s say you want to concentrate on four-letter names in the form consonant-vowel-consonant-vowel. You’d do that because the form provides a short, easily pronounced (in almost any language) and easily spelled name: just perfect if you’ll be looking for referrals. And of course, you’d want that four-letter root to be relevant to your naming project.

Here are three such words we can use as examples: rare, cape and mesa

Now you can try two different approaches to begin with.

Substituting ending vowels

First, substitute other vowels for the last vowel in each root word. This retains the four-letter cvcv format so pronouncing and spelling each will be easy even if the new words are unfamiliar. Here’s what I mean:

In the first two examples, where the last “e”s are silent, we’ve added a new syllable with the substitution, but really haven’t lengthened the name. With “Mesa”, we’ve just invented a new four-character words.

Adding an additional letter

In this example we’ll just add what looks like a random consonant or vowel to the end of our original root word. However, for the roots ending in a silent “e”, we won’t add “d”, “n”, “r”, “s” or “y” because these are common, meaningful add-ons already (rarer, caped, capes).

As with any naming approach, often times they bare no fruit, but every-so-often, a gem can appear, literally out of nowhere.

This technique will also work with multisyllabic words roots as well, and can be combined with other techniques (relevant prefixes and suffixes for instance) as I’ve outlined here in the past.

So just another weapon for your ever-growing naming arsenal. Use with gusto.

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How often has a name mislead you?

It happens to me quite often. Perhaps it’s because I take things quite literally. Or it could be the name just isn’t relevant to the product. Here are two quite different examples:

The fast-food chain Popeye’s offers Cajun-influenced food – dirty rice and such. Yet the first image that comes to mind for me is Popeye the Sailor Man, and “logically”, seafood.

I don’t know if younger people are even aware of Popeye from the comic strips and animated cartoons of years gone by. There are a couple of food associations for Popeye apart from the obvious seafood image: spinach, the source of Popeye’s strength; burgers eaten voraciously by his sidekick, Wimpy, and even olive oil, an alternate spelling of his girl friend’s name, Olive Oyl. But nowhere in the Popeye mythology is Cajun/Creole/Louisiana cuisine apparent.

So why was the Popeye name adopted? I have no idea, I would not have named the chain with what I feel was an irrelevant, even inappropriate, name.

In another context is the adaptation of the name Dove for chocolate treats. Even though they aren’t in the same product categories, the soap of that name can’t help but “rub off” on the chocolate bars and candies.

Eating soap brings to mind getting my mouth washed out with it after my mother heard me swear as a youngster. Both the soap and the candy are appealing in their own rights, and they’re both aiming at discerning, quality-oriented markets. I also think both are female-oriented. So perhaps only a literal-minded critic like me would think twice before adopting a name that’s been well-branded even in an entirely different product category. But I would certainly think twice or thrice before making such a recommendation.

My point with these examples is that, though they may be successful in their respective markets, I think less confusing, more unique names might have made them stronger still.

I’d like to hear what you think. I’d also wish you to share other examples of names that confuse you in one way or another. Because we learn from mistakes – but they needn’t always be our own mistakes.

Tags: Naming Issues // Add Comment »

Quite often, parents name a child without considering the consequences.

My personal example: my parents, being of Dutch decent, named me Martin It was my grandfather’s name. Plus it meant “warlike” and came from the root, Mars.

So almost immediately upon entering grade school, the recess bullies began calling me “Fartin’ Martin”.

I hated my name. And once I got to high school, students and teachers alike wanted to shorten Martin to Marty. I hated Marty more than I hated Martin. Today, I like Martin very well, but Marty still alienates me.

Be careful what you name your child

And quite often, the name chosen by an entrepreneur will suffer the same fate at the hands of unthinking and uncaring stakeholders.

They’ll mispronounce, misspell and generally mess with it. If there’s a way to make it more “friendly” or informal, they will find it.

You will also note that people will want to shorten your name, particularly if that name contains three multisyllabic words. They’ll do that mostly by resorting to initials. Employees and even executives of companies with a long-worded name will resort to initials internally, and then those initials will begin to be used publically.

The shortening phenomenon is detrimental if you are trying to build a brand around the extended name.

Several companies have just gone with the flow and adopted shorter versions. The most significant and successful at this was Federal Express. They’re now just FedEx – and that works. But some have gone that way and the results, at least from a branding point of view, haven’t faired as well. Remember when Washington Mutual became WaMu?

The moral: Think like a seven-year-old bully

Think how a bully might contort your prized name – the one you’ll invest a pot of money and energy promoting. Think about how people will try to twist the name into a shorter, more irrelevant and irreverent nick name. How will they – including employees – want to make it easier to write or say as time goes by? Then ask others to find ways to mess withr your prime name candidates.

Make this part of your name evaluation checklist. Then perhaps chose a name that’s less likely to be corrupted.

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If you’re doing business on the web – generating leads, selling product or establishing an “authority” image – then you know the importance of generating relevant traffic.

And you know that search engines are a major source of relevant traffic. But unless you already own a well-known, top-of-mind company name, people don’t search for business names using Google, Yahoo or Bing. They use generic keywords to find the product or service they are researching or purchasing.

And the way you get recognized in a search engine is to be on their first page of results when people search for the keyword(s) that best describe their need or desire. Getting on the first page requires that you optimize your site by making it relevant using a host of search engine optimization (SEO) techniques.

Name as SEO component

A major characteristic of a web site for SEO is the domain name of the site. Thus, if your site’s domain name contains the keyword your prospects are using to find businesses relevant to yours, it stands to reason your position in the search engines will be higher than if your domain name does not include the searched keyword.

But keywords are usually descriptive and generic. And business names should not be descriptive and generic. Business names should be unique and memorable; at least businesses that aren’t exclusively web-based. So there’s the predicament: how do I have a relevant, searchable domain name and a unique, compelling business name?

Naming hierarchies answer the call

We are aware of the many companies that have multiple businesses and/or products. Each of those entities has a distinct name, and some of those brands will have products – line extensions – under them. Then many products will have branded characteristics or features as well. Within these companies a naming architecture, or hierarchy, has been established which brand managers adhere to when it’s time to name a new product, corporate division or, yes, a web site.

The answer to the dilemma of the domain vs business name is to treat the domain name as an association to the business brand. The domain name should be created with the major keyword as part of the name. The business has a more “people-appealing” name that differentiates and delivers a suggestion of the brand’s promise.

Real live example

You are reading a blog post at Business Naming Basics. I chose this name after doing my keyword research and found, not the most used keyword, but one I felt I could raise to the top of the Google rankings (first page). The site name and its contents are relevant to the search term.

But my business name is Signature Strategies. The company does create names for companies, and it also helps smaller businesses with brand strategy and management; graphic standards and trade dress; name, logo and tagline creation, and brand audits and positioning research. So naming is a subset of the business.

And because I derive much of my business from Internet contacts, I wanted a domain name that would attract relevant visitors to my web-site. Signature Strategies would not be that traffic-generator for the service of naming. Now I also have a Signature Strategies web site – www.signaturestrategies.com – where I also blog, but that site is not expected to get a lot of search engine traffic. Most of its visitors are folks who have read an article I’ve posted on the web, backlinks from other branding sites and my social networking activities.

Know what you’re naming and why

That’s the real message here. Before naming your business, or your web-site, or your product, or your new subsidiary, take the time to create a naming brief, one that gives you direction based on long-range goals and missions. This goes for anything you name in the future. It’s also a good idea to establish your brand architecture structure early on because if you don’t, in all likelihood you’ll have to backtrack – rename or rebrand parts of your business that tend to confuse customers and prospects.

So it’s best to begin with a brand platform (the structure that contains the brand hierarchy). You can find help in constructing the platform at Signature Strategies web-site. Then create a naming brief for each aspect of your business that needs a name, following the brand hierarchy you’ve already established.

Yes, there’s more to business naming than a brainstorming session and trademark search.

Tags: Name Management, Naming Strategies // 2 Comments »