Brand Name Development, Part 1
Photo a worker on the Chrysler building. Chrysler was named after the company founder, Walter P. Chrysler.
Like naming your make-believe band, a child or a newfound kitten, the job of picking your company’s name can be daunting. Entrepreneurs face a host of challenges when launching a new company, including legal paperwork, accounting, marketing, and recruiting clients. One thing that should not be overlooked, however, is creating an appealing company name.
For the new decade I have decided to change the name of my consulting company, JYK Marketing. As I’ve grown my consulting practice from word-of-mouth freelance gigs to a full time job, I have revisited the name that represents my work many times. In 2010 I am changing my company’s structure to a LLC and creating a new name as part of this process.
In Part 1 of my approach to developing a brand name, I explored various naming conventions and developed a long list of words that fit my new brand message and positioning. In Part 2, I will narrow these concepts by checking trademarks and creatively evaluating each name’s fit.
Types of Brand Names
Brand names have many origins, but most fall into one of these groups:
- Acronyms and portmanteaus like GEICO from Government Employees Insurance Company and Comcast from communications and broadcast.
- A person’s name like Chrysler after company founder, Walter P. Chrysler
- Real words (Adobe, Nike, Virgin) including mispellings (Digg (dig), Google (googol))
- Internet start-ups have broken many traditional naming conventions with names coming from made up words (Hulu, Twitter), affixed words (Napster, Friendster), and tweaked words (ebay,iTunes) More here.
Generating the Word List
My new company name must be recognizable, trustworthy, memorable and meaningful–with a story behind it that adds value to the brand. It should roll off the tongue and give some insight into my services. Here are some questions that got me started:
- What does my company do? What are the key words in my elevator pitch?
- Who else does what I do and how did they pick their names? Are there any common naming conventions in my industry that I should stick to or break from?
- If I were to personify the business how would I characterize it?
Answering these questions generated a short list of conventional naming ideas to throw into the mix:
Founder’s Name: John, Koblinsky, JYK, JK
Locations: Arlington, Virginia, 703 (area code), 1st St (street address), Clarendon (neighborhood), Mid-Atlantic
Services: Marketing, Marketing Research, Insights, Foresights, Planning, Marketing Strategy
Service niches and adjectives: Digital, Green, New Media, Sustainable, Online, Consumer, Quantitative, Innovative
Additional Modifiers: Consulting, Group, LLC, Partners, Bros, Co., & Sons
In the search for a new name I have also considered unique words that I might use or tweak. Literature, architecture, religion, nature, science and sport have been sources of such words. Among those I added to the list are: moso (a type of bamboo), breakaway (from cycling), bullnose (the first open step in a stairway) and Jackson Island (from The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.
Languages like Latin can be a great source of appealing words. One of my favorite portmanteaus is Verizon, which combines veritas (Latin for truth) and horizon.
With a fixed list of about 100 words that satisfied my criteria of being recognizable, memorable and meaningful, I completed the first stage of creating my new brand name.
UPDATE: Continue reading Part 2 here…
