Quick Tip: What Makes A Brand Name Great

What’s in a name? Would Home Depot, or Best Buy, or the “i” empire of iPads, iPods and iPhones “by any other name be just the same”?

Choosing the right name is a key part of any rebranding effort or campaign introduction. It is an art and a science, and is best approached as a team effort with specific objectives and criteria in mind.

These 9 criteria should be part of any name-choosing decision:

1. Appearance

2. Distinction

3. Depth

4. Energy

5. Humanity

6. Positioning

7. Sound

8. “33” (What?? - A reference to the buzz created by the mysterious appearance of the number 33 on bottles of Rolling Rock beer and the theories that abound about its meaning.)

9. Trademark

Find more details on each of these criteria in this blog post: 9 Criteria for Choosing the Best Business Name Possible.

Just for fun, see what happens when names go wrong: 11 Brand Names That Simply Couldn’t Survive the Times.

Or use our scoring system to compare prospective names by downloading our Brand and Campaign Name Scorecard.