Name Awards

When you are naming a series of Nordic longboats…

Viking River Cruises is introducing a whole new series of long ships in Europe. They sure look like they will take up at least two jetties each time they dock, plus could get out of kilter going through some bridge arches and wrap themselves around one of the pylons.

But I am only criticizing because I can’t get away for a trip in short order. Must say I am impressed with how they are using Facebook too. One of the better consumer marketing efforts. Of course I liked the ship christening ceremony.

And, as for the names of the new long boats: Viking Embla, Viking Aegir, Viking Freya, Viking Idun, Viking Njord, Viking Odin. Don’t worry, after one cruise and some wine from their own Viking winery, your ship’s name will roll off the tongue and never be forgotten.

Plus these names really add a touch of Nordic class and separate the boats from their sister Princess Cruises with their English party names.

Is LawPivot pronounced “Law Pee Vo”?

Earlier this week a friendly young gentleman called me to see if our company needed occasional legal services, or at least the chance to post some questions to a large panel of lawyers. When he introduced his company I couldn’t catch the name.. but it sounded a lot like Law Penis to me.

I was so shocked, I asked him specifically what was the company name, and he slowly said “Law Pee Vo“. If Ihadn’t been in a good mood, I probably would have been pee’d off. But instead, 10 minutes later I called him back. Got the answering service which at first didn’t know which of their many clients had been calling me. But I persuaded the well-spoken young lady to work down the list of her clients with Law at the beginning.

That is when I discovered a company called Law Pivot was actually using telemarketers (on shore incidentally) that were badly mangling their name! I also discovered that they were probably using this marketing tactic because they are not showing up on the first 25 pages of a Google search for Ask a Lawyer a question.  What a pity for an apparently good service that has had some big PR coverage in the past.

Many people use any service they prefer. Me, if I can’t get past the name, I move on to another supplier. And I hope this reminds more of you to listen yourself to the verbal branding messages your hired flunkies are putting out….so they don’t pee all over it.

Drobo is a great new name… abbreviations can be winners

Data Robotics was a practical name, if somewhat long in the tooth namewise. But this week we offer our name of the week award to them for picking their already used abbreviation of Drobo as the product line name as well as the new company name.  Not Dr Obo, not DatRob, not Datarob, not dRobotics…. just simply Drobo.

So now Drobo can go go… not that they appear to need much help from us.. they are already zooming along in the small business add-on storage marketplace.

Juice in the City juices up coupons for moms.

I do like studying names that are part of some genre, or connected or similar companies. I especially enjoy it when the USA Today newspaper helps me out and runs a story on a current trend. Well such is their recent story on companies that are shooting to compete or expand upon the presently very hot Groupon phenomenon.

They featured Juice in the City and their focus on moms and the mom market – probably the biggest market in my humble opinion – of people who more often turn to coupons out of necessity rather than desire. Of course, any of the others could target moms as well, especially if they had a  name that more implied moms rather than one implied teenagers flirting in the city. And what about all the country folks?

USA Today says BuyWithMe, Tippr, CrowdSavings, Yipit, Lashou, CatchofTheDay, Scoopon (love this name) and Plum District, among others, have also received funding. Seems like someone sent the investors a coupon themselves! Catch of the Day sounds kind of fishy to me, and I wonder if former VP Al Gore knows what his wife Tipper is up to? Maybe he should Lashou her!

Maybe Detroit should simply drop the D

As I pulled to a stop in the traffic I looked up and what did I see? Envoy.

And I know I had just passed an Escalade and thought about why the Equinox was selling so well.

But these are GM vehicles. And I have previously written about Ford’s E lineup – Escort, Escape, Explorer, Excursion, Edge. What is going on? There are 26 letters in the English alphabet and E is certainly not the most popular one. Anyone got any inside into this trend or is it purely accidental?

Maybe E just naturally follows D and these vehicles usually originate in and around Detroit. Hence my suggestion of dropping the D and calling it Etroit.

Sometimes you can get a plain simple word trademarked.

I was keenly reading the story of Dr Raymond Damadian and his invention of the first MRI machine in the latest INC magazine, when I wondered why he called the company Fonar. I was expecting some simple basic answer like First Sonar… but it has been a slow day and I don’t have any other interesting names on my mind. So I dug around.. and found nothing.

But along the way, I found out that more recently he also invented the first MRI scanner in which the patient can sit upright. And what name did he use? What registered trademark did they get?  Yes, the word Upright itself. Wow. How cool and unusual. Now what are the competitors going to do when they too get around to vertical scanners. This is a great example of first mover advantage (as I call it) in naming. One day Upright® could easily have become a generic word – and therefore not trademarkable. Instead it is Fonar’s registered trademark unless the USPTO work is ever reversed. They surely deserve our name award of the day.

Strong Japanese brands will endure

Of all the Asian countries, Japan has always been the one that has been the most brand-centric. Today they boast some of the biggest international brands. In fact, given the small size of the country, their brands carry an amazing amount of power around the world.

While the whole world watches and prays for Japan following their recent multiple natural disasters, I confidently predict that we will return to our belief in the quality and technology and purity of brands like Toyota, Mitsubishi, Honda, Yamaha, Nikon, Sapporo, Hitachi, Toshiba, Seiko, Epson, Sony, Fujitsu, Kikkoman, Nintendo, Kirin, Asahi, Subaru, Isuzu, Shizeido and many more. These companies are probably all scrambling to figure alternative suppliers, supply roots, factories and other infrastructure. Maybe they will even offshore more work. But unlike OEM or commercial business buyers, consumers don’t care. We trust the brands, which is just one basic lesson in why branding is so important.

See Japanorama.com for some interesting books about Japan that are available in English – even many in eBook format. Many of these are about the Japanese language and some of its history too.

Isn’t it interesting how comfortable we are using and pronouncing these mega brands from Japan, even though most of us don’t have a clue what the names or the words mean. Many are actually old family names. Some, like Sony, are coined English words and not Japanese per se at all – yet they are household names around the world. Part of this explanation is that Japanese is a phonetic language. In other words, tt is based on sounds, And in fact, many of these sounds overlap with sounds in English or Western European languages (but not as much overlap with American ‘loud’ English).

Does money let you use any name you care to?

USA Today, and other news feeds, reported this week the pending arrival of a new super high end sports car made by the small Pagani car company in Italy. Italians seem to have the lock on these super high end breeds, but I notice most owners just talk about owning a Ferrari or Lamborghini, etc. On the other hand Pagani is trying to have completely separate models – and one of those reasons were they couldn’t pass US smog and safety requirements before.

This also means they couldn’t get to half of the world’s market for price is no limit super sports cars. So that is all about to change with the introduction of the Huayra!  The what?  Hooray for ya.. I can’t pronounce it either and have to look up the spelling each time. So what if you are Argentinian and picked Pagani (sounds like a French bakery) for a car company name. So what if you know Huayra is a wind in Argentina.

No one in US with a million dollars for a car knows that (at least not before this announcement)… since almost no one else knows that. Not knowing a name is one thing. Not being able to spell or pronounce it is something else…….. How are you going to show off and tell all your country club friends you drive a Hooray Ya for which you paid a cool million plus??

Farmers Field would work better in MidWest

When I first heard that there would be a new football stadium named Farmers Field I immediately wondered which mid west farm belt town had pulled off this coup. So while it is a great name insofar as corporate sponsored/branded stadiums go, it could be considered a bit out of place in Los Angeles. As a commentator on an L.A. blog posted, it would have been perfect for Bakersfield.

Of course now I know it is the work of Farmer’s Insurance… who have been slowly bugging everyone breathing in California. Farming is a big industry in California, but it is not the first thing that comes to mind in downtown tinsel town area that already has a Staples pavilion next door. And Staple diets are not the norm there either, so I suppose we should just embrace this new name and thank them for making the phonetics work.

The fun will really begin when they try to name a team… assuming they find one. Would you like to play for the Farmers?

Why not let one of the soccer teams use it in the meantime, they desperately need more space? And this is what real football with the foot is about in SoCal – as opposed to throw ball.

Oh don’t we all wish we were Forever 21!

I am not usually a fan of names with numbers in them, but in this case I have to retract my words. Before I read of their business success in various magazines, including a fabulous spread recently in Business Week, I had noticed their shops in various malls.

Every time I saw their signs they caught my eye and made me instinctively think: What do they do? Of course, a quick look in the window of a Forever 21 store was disappointing for me…. as I obviously had no excuse being there or even looking in the window… unless I could borrow some teeny bopper to befriend me.

They definitely have a different decor compared to the average girls’ shop – but more than that they really do have a casual vitality that others strive for but seldom obtain. Of course, very few stores target the high school girl with cheap copies of the latest fashions… ironically  girls who are still dreaming of being 21.

Their logo is rather plain, but I don’t have a better idea. In fact, with such a great name, it probably doesn’t need any embellishment at all. Finally I love the fact that no one will doubt it is spelled 21 and not twenty one at the end. Why? Because it is a magic number that completes a great name!