Apple. Basquiat. Nike. Woolf.
An exploration into the names we remember.
People like to debate how much a name matters.
Generally speaking, there are two schools of thought:
It matters very little
It matters a great deal
I shamelessly fall into the latter camp.
Allow me to make my case.
Back in 1976, Apple wasn’t the obvious winner.
The personal computer industry was crowded with names.
MITS.
Kaypro.
Commodore.
Sinclair Research.
Texas Instruments.
Tandy Corporation.
Osborne Computer Corporation.
That last name on the list is long enough to choke a horse.
To make matters worse, companies were rolling out computers with names that sounded like the offspring of R2D2.
ZX80.
SX-64.
Sol-20.
VIC-20.
TRS-80.
TI-99/4A.
PET 2001.
Altair 8800.
IMSAI 8080.
Then, there was Apple.
Don’t get me wrong, Apple didn’t always nail the names of their products.
Apple II wasn’t particularly inventive.
But, it was lightyears better than the TI-99/4A.
Apple is the brand we remember.
It became a winner in personal computers.
And, one of the most valuable companies in history.
To be fair, Apple didn’t dominate personal computers because of its name alone.
They had a fanatical leader, a great product, unparalleled distribution and near-perfect timing.
Each of these factors played a part.
But, would Apple have experienced the same meteoric success if it were called something else? Something like Jobs Computer Corporation?
Absolutely not.
Apple’s name made personal computers sweet and approachable.
It didn’t sound like an evil, power-hungry conglomerate you’d see in an 80s action film. It’s products didn’t read like license plate numbers.
Instead, the name was so simple a child could remember it.
History shows the brand with the best name wins.
Best is relative here, obviously.
I wouldn’t say Smucker’s is the “best” name.
But, it’s certainly memorable.
Not to mention, they paired it with a brilliant slogan...
With a name like Smucker’s, it has to be good.
So, perhaps I’ll revise my last statement.
Instead, I’ll say the brand with the most memorable name wins.
What always perplexes me is how much time brands commit to their logo and how little time they devote to their name.
A brand’s logo matters.
But, at its most basic form, a brand is a name.
If I had a dollar for every stupid name I saw, I wouldn’t be running Honey.
The problem is that coming up with a memorable brand name is difficult.
There isn’t really a tried-and-true methodology.
I’m not so pretentious as to say I possess the formula.
However, I’d be happy to share how I approach naming at Honey.
More than a feeling.
When I think about naming, I first think about feeling.
What is the feeling I want to evoke in the customer?
From there, I think of something that symbolizes this feeling.
Nike did this beautifully.
Phil Knight’s upstart shoe company was originally called Blue Ribbon Sports.
Thank the gods he changed it.
If you think Nike would have become Nike with the name Blue Ribbon Sports, you’re out of your gourd. Their name was their greatest competitive advantage.
When we think Nike, we think victory.
This isn’t by happenstance.
Nike is the ancient Greek goddess of victory.
But, encapsulating the feeling is only half the battle.
The name has to be within reach of the tongue.
Make memory your ally.
Famous brands are like famous people. They possess memorable names.
In literature, there is:
Margaret Atwood
Ernest Hemingway
Octavia Butler
Virginia Woolf
Oscar Wilde
In sports, there is:
Serena Williams
Michael Jordan
Muhammad Ali
Lewis Hamilton
Tiger Woods
In film, there is:
Meryl Streep
Robert De Niro
Audrey Hepburn
Marlon Brando
Denzel Washington
In music, there is:
Billie Holiday
Prince
Dolly Parton
Frank Sinatra
Aretha Franklin
In art, there is:
Georgia O’Keeffe
Andy Warhol
Jean-Michel Basquiat
Leonardo da Vinci
Vincent van Gogh
Sure, each of these individuals possess(ed) otherworldly talents. However, we have no trouble fetching their names in a hurry.
The same is true for brands.
If someone were to hold a gun to your head, you would have no difficulty remembering the name Nike or Apple.
So, when naming a brand, it’s important to test its memorability.
It’s surprisingly easy to do this:
Make a list of the names you’re considering.
Show this list to a group of people
Let them stare at the list for a few minutes
Don’t let them take the list home
Call them a few days later
When you pick up the phone, don’t ask for their favorite names.
Ask them which names they remember.
Any name that goes unrecited should be cut, immediately.
I don’t care if it’s your daughter’s name.
Do as Stephen King recommends in his legendary book on writing...
Kill your darlings.
Only the names that are remembered should be considered.
You will likely find that the same 2-3 names come up, again and again.
After this, it’s up to you.
You must decide which name you’re going to hang the weight of your empire on.
Godspeed.
By Cole Schafer.