Blog Archives

Name of the Week – Mail Chimp

For a long time I have wondered how Mail Chimp grew so big so quickly, despite some formidable competitors like Constant Contact, Vertical Response or emailforce.io. The more I looked at it the more it seemed to me they did

Posted in Branding, Domain Names, Name Changes, Naming News, Strange Names, Trademarks

Name of the Week – Hello Sunshine

Many years ago I started my first iteration of Name of the Week when I learned that search engines wanted fresh content regularly to maintain your SEO score. And this was long before blogging and social media existed, let alone

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Posted in Branding, Consumer Goods, Domain Names, Sustainable Brand Names, Trademarks

It takes some spunk to name your company Splunk.

When I first heard the name Splunk® I thought how cool a name it was. Surely one of those new mobile apps for and by millennials. No, rather it is the name of a back end data server and privacy

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Posted in Branding, Domain Names, Name Origins, Naming Education, Naming News, Technology Names, Trademarks

Acuspire makes Startup Grind’s Top 50

In between handling our very big clients we are often working on small startups, not all of whom make a go of it. But when the do, we love it. Like hearing yesterday from Acuspire that they had been selected

Posted in Branding, Domain Names, Naming News, Technology Names

Mooboo – The Best Bubble Tea for You

“MooBoo Bubble Tea” has been hitting the headlines lately but not as a great product name. Instead there are the controversial issues regarding alleged unpaid hours issues (thankfully now resolved legally.) I wonder whether this burst the bubble of MooBoo

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Posted in Branding, Consumer Goods, Domain Names, Food Names, Name Origins, Naming Education, Rotten Names, Trademarks

Slick as a whistle pig

The title of this blog is taken directly from the heading of an article in a recent copy of Business Week – with thanks and acknowledgments. And I have used it since it was clearly authored to attract attention to

Posted in Branding, Consumer Goods, Domain Names, Hospitality & Travel, Strange Names, Trademarks, Wine Names

How to name your solar company or products

Last time I calculated carefully, there was a solar startup about every four and half hours in the USA alone. Even if that has now slowed down to two a day (probably unlikely or very conservative), what are you going

Posted in Branding, Consumer Goods, Domain Names, Industrial Products Naming, Naming Education, Naming News, Naming Resources, Technology Names, Trademarks

Where are the trademark police?

After a lot of deliberation, brain-storming and creative word smithing, you finally have a new unique name in your industry. And after a blessing by your own intellectual property legal counsel you have applied for, and received, a registered trademark.

Posted in Branding, Consumer Goods, Domain Names, Naming Education, Naming Resources, Trademarks

eero gives me ear ache

I have been thinking of a very positive headline for this posting all week, especially because I am very impressed with the rest of their marketing. But at the end of the day, eero is just a little too clever

Posted in Branding, Consumer Goods, Domain Names, Industrial Products Naming, Naming Education, Naming News, Strange Names, Technology Names, Trademarks

Harbor Freight is a fine name for a tool company

It is only now that I go to write this posting that I notice the full name of Harbor Freight is actually Harbor Freight Tools. So it doesn’t sound like a freight company after all for the few of us

Posted in Branding, Consumer Goods, Domain Names, Industrial Products Naming, Name Changes, Name Origins, Naming News, Trademarks

Recent Naming Articles

Brand insider articles from an experienced marketing team.

Mar 2023: Pricing your naming project

Oct 2021: The devil is in the trademark details

Mar 2019:The Power and Value of a Trademark

Jan 2019:4 common branding mistakes

Oct 2018: You named it What?

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See his industry naming commentary (where he takes a critical look at names) via the blog on this site