It is easy to forget that is was predicted that ‘Google’ would fail because it is a stupid name that no-one would want to say.

They said the same about ‘Twitter’.

And Heinz makes no sense as a name for baked beans, or for tomato ketchup, or for soup.

So a name is unlikely to break a genuinely good product, but it can be unhelpful. And a good name can accelerate success, and so why make life difficult for yourself? We offer such a niche service amongst all the broader things we offer because we have seen so many incorrect criteria attached to name selection. Whatever the stated criteria happens to be, we see the real criteria all too often being what is overly rational, or what feels familiar and comfortable, which can be the worst possible criteria as that can quickly turn into bland and forgettable. And the name is usually considered in isolation of the rest of the brand, as if it needs to work in isolation, which it almost never has to. So we decided to develop an approach that would help clients get to a name that would:

1. Fulfil their communications objectives
2. Be distinct and memorable, not bland and easily ignored
3. Be liked by their audiences
4. Be able to be registered everywhere needed

We’ve named it ‘Why Have A Bad Name When You Can Have A Good One?’

Here is the story of a name:

Talking of Google, the most sophisticated search engine in the world has been developed by some students at Stanford University because they got tired of having to search endlessly for things on the internet. Pouring over a computer screen, endlessly searching, made their backs ache, so they called their new search engine ‘Backrub’, because it relieved the pain in their backs. (Computer nerds!) They decided they wanted to commercialise their search engine and were told they would need to change the name. Wisely advised, they picked a name that reflected the product benefit: it can search further than any other search engine. In fact it can search so far that it can search as close to infinitely as is possible, and so they were going to name it after the number closest to infinity. But they were advised not to do that as they couldn’t trade mark it, so they altered it a bit. What is the number closest to infinity? Googol. If you put ‘Backrub’ into Google, the first entry you get is the history of Google.

Whilst most of us can make no sense of Google as a name, to the original target audience for Google it made perfect sense, and for them it had some wit to it, too. A very good name.