Ngày đăng: 30/12/2019
The world is becoming saturated with a series of similar products competing in the same market, and at that time, what makes a product chosen is not only the physical characteristics of the product, but mostly the values brought by the brand. Besides the color, the image or the mascot, one of the first things that comes to mind when thinking of a brand is the name. Therefore, besides business, marketing, and communication strategies, modern businesses are very interested in how to brand their products and services.
A brand name is a name used to name a line of products, services, or organizations in order to distinguish them from similar things. Brand names are often easily misunderstood as company’s names, and in essence, both are used for the purpose of calling and distinguishing, like the way each person is given a unique name. However, brand name has a narrower scope, it is only used to call a product or service of the company, under the company name – the name in the business registration file and legal documents. In many cases, brand name often appears more than the company name, which is why many people only know Omo washing powder, Comfort fabric softener or P/S toothpaste without being familiar with the company which owns those brands – Unilever.
Good and impressive brand names play an important role in capturing consumers’ minds and driving buying behavior. Therefore, business owners need to determine for themselves a naming strategy, a methodical naming process and reasonable investment for this job.
There are many names in the world and there are even new ways to name due to the need for innovation and creativity. In general, there are 5 common names used by brands:
This is a fairly common way, especially in the period before a product which was a breakthrough invention or renovation was produced, most of which are named after the inventor. Not only that, many other products and services also follow this trend, from famous brands in the world such as ADIDAS, GUCCI, TOYOTA, Walt Disney, to herbal tea Dr. Thanh, pho Thin, … of Vietnam. The obvious advantage of this type of name is that it does not take much effort to name, is easy to register for protection and the brand name is protected when a dispute occurs. However, because the brand name is so closely associated with the founder, it is difficult for the brand to franchise.
A descriptive name is a way of conveying a message about your product or service directly through meaningful words, including one or more words. Often, it also evokes the nature, personality and meaning of the brand in the easiest way to understand. That is the advantage of this method, because thanks to the direct description, readers can easily recognize the brand story and what you are offering. Typical examples of this method are Vietnam Airline, The Home Depot (the brand that sells leading construction and interior decoration products in the US) or Coca Cola (coca leaf, cola fruit).
However, the association is so easy that the descriptive brand name does not leave much impression in the minds of consumers, even it limits the creativity when choosing the name. Moreover, enterprises will face many difficulties and limitations if they want to expand their business, or be forced to choose a different brand architecture and ignore the old name because the descriptive name will directly limit the industry and market which businesses are engaged in. Surely Vietnam Airlines will not want to use its name for toothpaste products if they want to expand into fast-moving consumer goods
IBM (International Business Machines), BMW (Bayerische Motoren Werke) or KFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken) are examples of the abbreviated name. This type of name stands for the initials of the brand name, often used when the original brand name is too long. Therefore, it makes the brand more concise, easy to read and of course much easier to read. Compared to the full name, the abbreviation will be easier to remember, but when compared to other brands, the combined letters are not as impressive and easy to remember. In addition, the abbreviation makes the brand difficult to protect, for example, brands have to switch to protect the whole part of the brand by adding dashes to logos such as IBM or putting crosswords like FPT. . In particular, it will be difficult for businesses to build a brand identity based on abbreviations because they do not create associations or contain internal concepts to convey to readers.
This is considered one of the most popular naming methods today, with the use of a word that can, more or less, evoke a brand, product or service. Businesses can use a meaningful word which is taken from the dictionary to help customers easily associate with the category, service, the nature of the company, like Amazon. However, it will take you a long time to find an unused name if you want to use suggested names from a dictionary. At that time, you can be more creative by developing the brand name from a meaningful word, still bringing the suggestion as the way Zappos originates from Zapppatos – in Spanish means shoes. This variation of the suggested name format often makes a good and unique impression and is therefore very easy to apply for protection.
Another way to develop suggestive names is to put together meaningful words. This is also a fairly common and easy method for combining two elements such as Facebook (face and book), Microsoft (microphone and soft). In addition, many cases have also taken the brand name with a meaningful word but not related to the industry, a meaningful word or proper name with very few associations or just evoke an emotional aspect of the brand. No one would think they would buy a phone, tablet from Apple fruit, or buy from a website called Alibaba or Rong Bay.
Invented name is a brand new word that has never appeared in the dictionary, has no meaning and of course does not contain many messages. However, this method makes a strong impression because of its novelty. Google, Pepsi, Bing are famous examples of this method. This type of name is easy to remember and because it is unique, it is easy to apply for protection, though it is not meaningful at all. However, that nonsense makes readers easy to remember, even, enterprises sometimes want to maintain that nonsense, typically Google, this brand strongly protests when being included in the Dictionary as a verb means to search.
In addition to the common methods above, businesses can still choose to name the brand by place name (The North Face, Saigon beer, …) or by code (paint A-100). However, for any brand name, the most basic requirement to ensure when creating is to convey the right message and value of the brand. Ideally, the name will carry both the role model and the brand personality. Because this is one of the first touches and leaves the most impression with customers, so it is very good if it helps readers somewhat understand who the brand is. Technically, the brand name needs to be easy to read, easy to remember and especially easy to pronounce. In addition, enterprises should be careful when choosing a brand name to avoid negative misunderstandings in external markets. Coca Cola, for example, when it first entered the Chinese market was in big trouble when its brand name in Chinese was transcribed into Kekoukela – meaning “Bite the tadpole.” To change, the beverage company had to study more than 40,000 different characters to choose a more appropriate name: “kokou kole” – “happiness on the lips”. Finally, the most important rule is that a brand name must be protected, avoiding having to protect the image instead of the name.
