Naming Names in the Name Game
April 4th, 2008
Continuing on with the naming theme, Wired published an article this week praising electronic companies (specifically cellphone makers) for finally seeing the light and laying those long, inane alphanumeric names to rest.
Names like iPhone, RAZR, and Voloptuator Sexamajig are iconic, interesting, and stick in your mind. (Yes, I made that last one up.) And many companies are starting to wake up to this fact. At CTIA this year, we’ve noticed a good many manufacturers are dropping the awkward, ridiculous names that have weighted down perfectly good products in the past.
I know you can make a case for naming your product with numbers and letters (the one that pops into my head is BMW with their 1, 3, 5, 6, 7, X, Z and M series), but when it comes to phones, that’s another story.
People connect a lot faster with names that are real words than numbers and letters, which often read like the code on the bottom of your modem. And some of them are so complicated and long I can never remember them.
For instance, HP is doing a less than stellar job with laptops like the dv6700t series (not to be confused with the dv6700z series). Huh? Dell is one the verge with the XPS, but come on. Gimme a name that means something. That I can connect to. That I can easily talk to others about.
Names can be powerful, but they are also personal. They can bring personality and life to a product and help people connect with it faster and in a deeper way. But if you go the alphanumeric route, it can be another barrier of entry to your potential customers.
Other posts by Spike.
linkerjpatrick says:
Maybe it’s because I grew up in the “old Greenville” meat and three culture but it annoys and frustrates me to no end that I have not only have to speak but pronounce Italian just to order a cup of coffee. That’s not exactly alphanumberic but it another language and I feel less than “enlightened” when I’m standing there ordering to the point I just want to go for the endless cup at Waffle House (I love Waffle House, BTW).
The original examples you gave to bring to mind the naming of technologies that are great and help people be productive yet words like “Blog”, “RSS”, “icon” have made people I consider highly intelligent and educated stop in their tracks. What do we call it a “blog” on the web but a “column” in print?
April 4th, 2008 at 6:54 amBIG Kahuna says:
Naming is a tricky business. What one loves another hates. Here’s how we do it at BIG. We determine what the brand identity of the company will be and then leverage that identity with a name. For instance we just named an art storage vault company “Mind’s Eye”. The name comes from the identity that they provide custom vault solutions for their clients. Thus enabling their clients to use their imagination when designing their vault.
We steered clear of names like Fortress or Artex because customers ultimately wanted customization and personalization. Security was a given.
Love it or hate it? It clearly differentiates them from the crowed bunch. But once again it’s subjective.
If you’re interested:
http://www.imaginemindseye.com
April 4th, 2008 at 1:08 pm