NewYorker article gives insight into the Brand Naming process – and why your brandable domains may be so valuable

Naming companies spend months and weed through thousands of names before settling on a new brand name for a major product launch, according to a recent article entitled Famous Names, in the NewYorker.   The lengthy article follows a company called Lexicon, and tells the story of the creative process that resulted in the brand names BlackBerry, PowerBook, Swiffer, and Pentium among others.

After reading about the amount of time, effort, and brain power devoted to coming up with a new brand name, I have a new appreciation for how valuable the domain name must be that is the exact match for that newly minted product name.

The number of high-tech trademarks has jumped from under 10,000 in 1980 to over 300,000 now, according to the article, suggesting a huge demand for brandable domains.

The usual qualities of a great name are that it is short, has a consonant-vowel pattern, and has a pleasant sound.  But the art is to evoke the “story” of the product, even if it results in a product name that is not intuitive.   A successful brand is likened to a short poem, capturing the essence of many associations and meanings in one word.

An abstract of the article is available for free.  A subscription is required for the full article.