I recently finished a brand naming project. Here are a few thoughts and suggestions for anyone doing the same thing.
A great brand name is as important as ever. And it’s never been more of a minefield. Whatever word or common phrase you can think of, someone has already thought of it, registered it, and gobbled up the URL.
So what do you do?
You can make up words. Like Google.
Misspell words. Like Flickr.
You can invent imaginary partners. Like Abercrombie & Kent. (Kent existed, Abercrombie didn’t)
You can create both originality and intrigue with riddles. Like wealth manager eightfourtwo and agency 18 Feet And Rising.
You can throw in typographical oddities: ELFy.
Or use funky foreign accents: Über.
You can learn a lot from band names, too.
Try some pirate punctuation, like D’Ream.
Or mash-ups like Radiohead and Coldplay. (Or indeed Facebook and Microsoft).
So in our wonderful online world there are many traps to be dodged.
But with obstacles come opportunities.
Someone could have called their new chain of chocolate shops The Chocolate Shop or World Of Chocolate. Yawn.
But they chose Choccywoccydoodah instead.
Wonderful.
