A Naming Consultancy that means business

Business naming is difficult. Here are some insights
that our Consultancy has evolved to avoid the pitfalls

Next Page

Our business naming consultancy harnesses experience and learning, including
the following insights:

1. Understand the naming conventions of your busines sector (e.g. newspapers:
The Mirror, The Sun, The Independent etc) and whether you want to abide by them
or stand out by breaking them.

2. With your consultancy, choose the right name for your marketing spend. For example, found names (Orange, Apple, Virgin etc) only work for large exposure brands that can
own them through usage. For a smaller business they are impossible to defend.

3. Recognise that there is a huge difference between names and words: names have
a 'sticky', memorable quality. Descriptive names (International Business Machines) are
also hard to own and defend. An example is the generic, indefensible name Standard Oil, which everyone shortened to SO, being turned from words into the name: Esso.

4. Make sure your naming works for your audience and context. Movie stars know this, which is why True Grit stars John Wayne and not Marion Morrison (his given name).

5. Look for novelty in Corporate Identity, not the business name itself. Your name is probably the longest lasting of your corporate brand assets: you may revise Company Logo Design and colourways over time. Good consultancy will warn you against being seduced
by trendy naming styles (e.g. current trend for single, found words, graphically expressed
in all lower case letters).

6.Make sure your name is capable of consistent pronunciation, no matter the language.

7. Beware of creating naming that has an unintended meaning in another language.
Nova, or No Va, does not go in the Spanish car market.

8. Don't rely on quirky spelling to aid registration of your business name.
In a www.world, people search phonetically, so spelling your hairdresser's name Cutz
rather than Cuts doesn't help.

9. Throughout the process of naming development, keep your options open: never set
out to register just one name, keep a shortlist. Registration is inexpensive, and if you end
up registering more than one, you deny them to your competitors and can turn them into income if others want them enough.

10. Remember, two adults find it hard to agree on one word: the name of a child.
How can more adults, who my not love each other, all agree on the naming of a business?


Look at the examples on the following pages to see how the Greenhill McCarron
Business Naming Consultancy has adopted our own principles in developing Company Naming, Brand Naming and straplines