• by Ted Page , September 24, 2014

The inventors and engineers have spent years perfecting product X. It’s a giant leap forward in solving a common consumer problem – and it’s clean, green and sustainable. Now you have to go to market. What should you name this amazing new thing? Making the right decision could mean the difference between a billion dollar payday down the road, or a complete fizzle. Nobody remembers two innovative short video sharing sites from the ’90s – Atom films and iFilms. YouTube took over their business models and became a phenomenon in no small measure because it’s name spoke to people. Tesla makes great electric vehicles, but so does Nissan. But the Tesla name evokes pioneering genius (can you tell how badly I want one?). 

So, how do you go about naming your fabulous new product? Too often, companies jump into the creative brainstorming process prematurely, before they have developed the strategic underpinnings upon which the name and brand can be created. The result is they generate lots of names, but can’t decide on one because there’s nothing to inform their decision, no foundation to their ideas. Just as any product has an exact 3D CAD drawing created prior to manufacturing, the best names are based on a similarly exact blueprint. Here are some tips based on my experience working with clean-tech brands over the years. 

1. Determine your key audiences. Before you can come up with a name, you need to understand who your audiences are, and what matters to them. For an example let’s say a company has created a new, smaller next generation wind turbine. Their key audience is independent energy project developers. What the developers care most about was having a wind turbine that would help them grow their business in new markets closer to where power was being consumed. The secondary audience is consumers who could benefit from local, affordable clean energy. 

2. Develop your key message. The key message is one short sentence that combines what is unique about your product, and – based on key audience insights – why that unique benefit matters to your customers. The key message for the new wind turbine might be: “The smaller wind turbine that opens up new markets for development – and profits.” You can also think of this as your elevator pitch. In the time it takes to go from the 11^th floor to the 9^th floor, you should be able to tell someone your key message. 

3. Distill brand attributes into a short list of words. Based on the key message, and what’s unique about the product, work with your team to nail down five to ten words that exemplify your brand. For example: Innovative, totally different, magical, beautiful, next-generation.

4. Conduct a series of structured brainstorms. In this creative brainstorming phase, be sure to make the work you’ve done to date visible and understood by everyone involved. Use signage in your brainstorm room that displays your key message and core brand attributes. Talk everyone through how you arrived at your conclusions, and why the name must reinforce and embody those ideas. Designate one person to lead and facilitate these sessions so you stay on track. Every creative thinker needs boundaries in which be inventive. So focus each session on one type of name. All names typically fall into three categories: Evocative, Experiential or Descriptive. Yahoo, for example, is an evocative name – it gets across the feeling of surfing the web, while Safari is experiential. IBM (International Business Machines) is descriptive. Create columns of names for each category. Over the course of three to five brainstorms, you’ll have the walls of your meeting room covered with name options. 

5. Rank the names. Put all the names into a spreadsheet, then meet with the team to review each name one by one and give it a ranking on a scale of one to five. The ranking should be based on the degree to which the name supports the key message, how it encapsulates the core brand attributes you’ve agreed upon, and the degree to which it lends itself to creative expression in logo design and other future branding initiatives. After this process, you’ll be able to identify your top short list of names. Try to keep this list to no more than five. Then have someone on your team conduct top-line research on name and URL availability. The U.S. patent and trademark office has a website that lets you check names by industry category. And a simple web search can help determine if the name is being used. Be sure to also have the name checked for unsavory meanings in other languages globally. 

6. Sleep on it. This may sound unscientific, but it’s actually very scientific. Your mind keeps working when we are sleeping. When you wake up in the morning, what is the name that comes to mind first? More often then not, that name is the most memorable of the bunch. If you can’t get the name out of your head, that’s a good indicator that other people wont be able to either.