As the shake-out in the ad industry continues, traditional agencies and their names are vanishing, being replaced by agencies whose very names demonstrate that a new day has (finally) dawned:

The advertising business is undergoing an upheaval, forcing executives to radically change how they do business. Marketers are trying desperately to stay ahead of the technological innovations that are changing how consumers view their messages - and are putting pressure on their agencies to adapt.

The ad firms are more eager to please than ever. The major agencies face shrinking profit margins and sagging stock prices, leading to a shakeout and a frenzied effort to cut costs.

It is unclear if the traditional agencies will be nimble enough to halt a slow decline. Already, many famous names are vanishing: N.W. Ayer; Bates; Bozell; D’Arcy Masius Benton & Bowles; Earle Palmer Brown; Lintas; Warwick Baker O’Neill.

The big agencies also face hip, new rivals, which have pounced on the opportunity to steal business. Those boutiques use their oddball names - like 180, Amalgamated, Mother, Nitro, Soul, StrawberryFrog, Taxi and Zig - as branding devices to signal they are not about business as usual.

These so-called “oddball” names do quadruple duty — they demonstrate a different mindset and approach, they are less confusing, and they provide the agencies with a wealth of imagery for years to come in their own promotional campaigns. Such names also end the endless problems that ad agencies named for founders incur when there’s a shake up at the top.

The problem with a name like, “Bartleby, Scrivner, + Budd” is that when Bartleby is sacked for ethical transgressions that make their way into Adweek, the agency suddenly becomes Scrivner, Budd, Typee + Omoo, until of course the lusty affair between Scrivner and Typee culminates in a full-blown sexual harassment suit.

Founder-named names also have the problems that they:

• are chosen primarily to stroke the egos of the founders
• demonstrate a complete lack of creativity by a creative agency
• all sound alike
• ultimately result in clients demanding face time with the principals.

It’s all bad. And now these names just demonstrate “old school” — even the clients are tired of them.

Of the new batch of names, our favorite is Mother, because it works on the greatest number of levels and is at once benign and comforting and completely outrageous. Here is just some of the collective consciousness that Mother taps into:

den mother
earth mother
fairy god mother
love your mother
mother and child
mother and son
mother ann
mother bulb
mother bunch
mother cabrini
mother carey’s chicken
mother carey’s goose
mother carey’s hen
mother cell
mother child relations
mother church
mother clap
mother colony
mother complex
mother country
mother cyst
mother douglas
mother earth
mother figure
mother goddess
mother goose
mother goose rhymes
mother hen
mother house
mother hubbard
mother hubbard clause
mother huddle’s oven
mother india
mother instinct
mother jones
mother jones magazine
mother knows best
mother language
mother liquor
mother lode
mother love bone
mother mary bernadette
mother mold
mother naked
mother nature
mother night
mother nuclide
mother of all bombs
mother of bastards
mother of believers
mother of books
mother of cities
mother of god
mother of invention
mother of parliaments
mother of the chapel
mother of vinegar
mother outlaw
mother plant
mother queen
mother russia
mother sauces
mother seton
mother ship
mother shipton
mother sick
mother spleenwort
mother star
mother superior
mother superior complex
mother surrogate
mother teresa
mother tincture
mother to be
mother tongue
mother water
mother wit
mother with child
mother wort
mother yaw
mother’s apron strings
mother’s day
mother’s helper
mother’s little helper
mother’s mark
mother’s milk
mother’s son
motherboard
mother-cell
mother-child relations
mothered
motherese
mother-fucker
mother-fucking
motherglass
motherhand shiatsu
motherhood
motherhouse
motherhouses
mothering
mothering sunday
mother-in-law
mother-in-law apartment
mother-in-law joke
mother-in-law’s
mother-in-law’s tongue
motherland
motherlands
motherless
motherlessness
motherlike
motherliness
motherly
mother-naked
mother-of-pearl
mother-of-pearl cloud
mother-of-thousands
mother-of-thyme
mothers
mothers boy
mothers daughter
mothers of invention
mothers of pearl
mothershead
mothershed
mother-sick
mothers-in-law
mother-water
motherwell
motherwell and wishaw
motherwell football club
motherwell robert
motherwell william
mother-wit
mother-wort
motherworts
mothery
queen mother
whistler’s mother

Now try the same exercise with the name “D’Arcy Masius Benton & Bowles”. Go ahead, take all the time you need.

From USA Today:

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — IAC/InterActiveCorp Chief Executive Barry Diller likes his latest planned online acquisition. He’s just not that fond of its name.

Diller on Tuesday told an audience of media and executives that the more he learns about the search capabilities of Ask Jeeves Inc., which New York-based IAC is buying for $1.85 billion in stock, the more convinced he is that the firm can gain market share against search rivals Google Inc., Yahoo Inc. and Microsoft Corp.’s MSN.

Ask Jeeves will get an infusion of cash for marketing and development, but its brand name is unlikely to survive in its current form.

“We’re thinking about renaming it,” Diller said during a question and answer session at the D3 — All Things Digital conference in Carlsbad. “It probably won’t be called Ask Jeeves.”

The conference was sponsored by The Wall Street Journal.

“What will it be called?” asked conference host and Wall Street Journal columnist Kara Swisher.

“Might be one of those words without the other,” Diller answered. The new name has not been decided, he added.

So which one Ask or Jeeves? Jeeves wouldn’t be much of a change. Ask by itself presents its own issues, for starters it would have to fight for mind share with the just-launched Answers.com and the already-established About.com. They’d be looking at Ask.com, Answers.com & About.com — talk about muddy. And none of the three sites could ever drop the “.com” from their name, because all of their names are too generic to trademark without it.

Of bigger concern is the track record of generic brands on the web, especially in this space. Remember FindWhat, LookSmart, InfoSeek, AllTheWeb, etc? How about Pets.com, Drugstore.com or Business.com? And there are no intellectual property laws stopping anyone from launching AskAbout.com, AboutAnswers.com or AskAboutAnswers.com.

Any way you slice it, the choice between Jeeves and Ask is a real Diller pickle.

Protesters are always dumping on the WTO, so we thought we’d take a moment to celebrate the valuable work this organization does. Hosting important summit meetings, for example.

Last year’s World Toilet Summit was held in Beijing, and the 2005 World Toilet Expo & Forum just wrapped-up in Shanghai.

Given the huge lift in positive brand image these Chinese destinations garnered from the events, the competition to determine where this year’s World Toilet Summit will splash down has been turgid. The all-out warfare between the State of Kansas, the city of Sao Palo and the former Yugoslavia spilled out over the rim on several occasions.

In the end, Belfast wiped clean the competition and was chosen to host the next Summit this coming fall. Here’s a whiff of what to expect:

• Wide ranging toilet-related topics covered by the Experts!
• Benefit from an interesting mix of plenary sessions covering in-depth situational studies and invaluable experiences from not less than 25 international and local speakers…

So c’mon, take the plunge, and reserve your seat today.

Logo is the name of MTV Networks’ new Gay / Lesbian / Transgender-themed channel. Logo comes out next month, but for those of you who can’t wait for a logo outing, the folks at b3ta have outed a bunch of logos this month via their Phallic Logo Awards.

Reports the Twin Cities Pioneer Press:

After nearly four months of research and thousands of options, American Express Financial Advisers on Wednesday plans to unveil a new corporate name to its employees and independent advisers.

Company officials are keeping the moniker close to the vest, but they say it won’t include the three letters “IDS,” which stand for Investors Diversified Services, the regionally famous name of American Express Financial’s predecessor company.

“I feel the name that we landed on really conveys the attributes that we will be advertising and talking about as we build the company,” Chief Marketing Officer Kim Sharan said Monday in an interview….

…The name search included American Express Financial’s 18,000 employees and financial advisers nationwide and the New York branding agency of Lippincott Mercer. Forty percent of employees and advisers participated in an online survey to determine what characteristics they most associated with the company, Sharan said.

“There has been such buzz about this place shortly after the spinoff was announced,” said David Kanihan, a spokesman for American Express Financial Advisors. “The name is something people can really latch onto.”

The company determined its name should reflect these characteristics: personal and approachable, authentic, pro-active, creative, knowledgeable and vast, Sharan said.

Amex won’t say what the new name is, but we can give you a peek. Between April 11-13 of this year they filed the following trademarks under “financial services”:

Archetype
Amplify
Amworth
Ameriprise
Luminous
Oakbridge
Sageborne
Sagemont
Riversource
Tiller

Filing multiple marks at the end of a naming process is a typical procedure, giving American Express multiple options during the global vetting process. So which of these names will be THE name?

We’re going to guess that it will be Ameriprise, though we hope it won’t be. Anyone else?

UPDATE 5/25: Don’t say we didn’t warn you. In a quick change of course, American Express went from being secretive about the new name yesterday to announcing it today. As predicted, they went with Ameriprise, because despite the spin, it was the easiest name to sell internally. How can we tell? From the Star Tribune:

“The name Ameriprise reflects both our history and our strengths as one of the leading financial services firms in the United States,” said Jim Cracchiolo, chairman and CEO of Financial Advisors said in a statement. “The name represents our American roots and the vastness of our nationwide network of over 10,500 financial advisors. It also embodies the enterprising culture our people bring to bear in helping provide our clients the peace of mind that comes with planning for a secure financial future.”

Compare the rationale above with the name attributes they were looking for, as announced yesterday:

The company determined its name should reflect these characteristics: personal and approachable, authentic, pro-active, creative, knowledgeable and vast, Sharan said.

Well, “vast” made the cut anyway. But in order to help push the pedestrian, internally-focused name in a bold and exciting direction, the logo team has devised a revolutionary visual concept for a financial service company. Hold onto your hats:

The Ameriprise Financial logo is based on a compass, designed to symbolize how the company helps its clients navigate toward their financial futures.

Just when you think you’ve seen it all before….

From The Financial Times of London:

Only days after rebranding the DTI as the Department for Productivity, Energy and Industry as part of his reshuffle, Tony Blair has caved in to universal derision by reverting to Department of Trade and Industry.

The prime minister was persuaded to retreat by Alan Johnson, whom he appointed on Friday to head the department.

In his first - and last - newspaper interview as secretary of state for productivity, energy and industry, Mr Johnson explained his insistence on becoming simply trade and industry secretary.

The Department for Productivity, Energy and Industry had attracted “various descriptions … penis and dippy”, Mr Johnson told the Financial Times. The CBI’s lambasting of the “old-fashioned corporatism” of the title had stung “and the unions weren’t keen on it either”.

There was also a serious concern that the loss of “trade” from the title would send a misleading signal that the department’s support for business overseas was “somehow part of the past”.

Less than a week into his new job, Mr Johnson concluded that the estimated six-figure cost of rebranding was not justified.

By reverting so quickly to DTI, the DPEI scheme involved no more than the use of “one screwdriver to take down three letters [and] screwing [them] back up”.

Insert your own joke here: ___________

Here is an online focus group created by a naming company to get your input on what they should name their online focus group. We swear we don’t make this stuff up.

The choices are Decision Driver, Idiometrics or Proofpoint. If only they knew how fitting “Idiometrics” is….

Check out this enigmatic press release from the naming company with the longest name in the naming business, Zenmark Brand Engineering, Inc.:

Zenmark Brand Engineering, Inc. announced today that the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has received and acknowledged the company’s patent application filing for its invention of a unique and innovative creative development process in the area of product, service, and company naming. Zenmark’s Verbal Identity Engineering (Patent Pending) process has proven to revolutionize the naming industry by applying a rigorous and repeatable methodology to the often unstructured and undisciplined process of brand name creation.

Here is a quick comparison of the results Zenmark Brand Engineering, Inc. has harvested from their “Verbal Identity Engineering (Patent Pending Process)” and the results of their competitors. The names of the naming companies are in bold; the names each has created using their own process are not so bold:

Zenmark Brand Engineering, Inc.: Amicore, Afaria, Applimation, Azenity, Certiport, Coalogic, Palaterra, Phyve

Interbrand: Certance, Lumiq, Syngenta, Xignux

Brighter Naming: Cataligent, Concuity, Epizon

Master McNeil: Activant, Contivo, Covigo, Covansys, Comergent, Conexant, Omniva, Optivo, Optimos, Spansion

NameStormers: Adeptra, Arconix, Asurent, Calibria, Cambium, Ledgent, Resilien, Solidium, Vyzo

Nambase: Decise, Evolutia, Praxi, Primaxis, Prinergy

Catchword: Cysive, Delinea, Tavant

Idiom: Encysive, Predicant, Qorus, Theravance, Stratify, Wherify, Vivera, Viterion, Vivonic

Lexicon: Geneer, Generon, Luxeon

Metaphor: Actional, Anadigm, Diversa, Enlight, Optis, Sageo, Viador

NameLab: Cognos, Equant

Landor: Acterna, Agilent, Astrium, Avolar, Calibrus, Cendian, Certegy, Clarica, Innovene, Onity, Midea, Paxonix, Solekia, Solutia, Spherion, Uniqa

On what evidence will the patent office decide that Zenmark Brand Engineering, Inc. has a process that is uniquely different than its competitors? By asking all of the naming companies listed above to supply their processes for comparison? Unlikely. Surely not from comparing the resulting names, as that would lead anyone to the conclusion that all of these naming companies have exactly the same process in place.

If Zenmark Brand Engineering, Inc. is granted a patent on this revolutionary naming process, where does that leave its competitors? Out of business.

Such are the perils of morpheme addiction.

We couldn’t think of anything funny to say today, but then this press release came in :

Zero-Knowledge Systems Inc., a provider of managed Internet services to broadband providers, announced today that it has changed its name to Radialpoint.

“Radialpoint is a name and brand that reflects our business today and the unique vision we have for managing and delivering future Internet services,” said Hamnett Hill, President & CEO of Radialpoint.

“Zero-Knowledge was a name that served us well for many years, but no longer fits the company or its products. As we continue to add leading broadband providers […], it is important that our name and brand accurately reflect what we do and the market leadership we have achieved in the managed Internet services industry.”

The name change was approved by Zero-Knowledge’s board and shareholders in late February 2005.

Radialpoint retained Idiom, a firm that specializes in naming, to assist its re-branding efforts. Pentagram developed the look and feel of Radialpoint’s name, logo and brand.

Irving Oil of Canada and Maine runs 350 convenience stores named Mainway within their gas stations. But a name change is afoot:

Executives at Irving Oil Ltd. knew they had a problem with their Mainway brand when a survey found that only 3 percent of shoppers there correctly identified the store they’d just visited.

More than 96 percent of customers called it “the Irving station.”

So, the Canadian company has launched an ambitious plan to rebrand its 350 convenience stores, including 50 in Maine. Its stores in Elliot and Wells this weekend will became the first in Maine to get the new moniker - Bluecanoe.

“Bluecanoe” name [sic] doesn’t mean anything in particular - yet. The company will spend an enormous amount of money (it won’t say how much) infusing the word with the meaning that Irving wants consumers to take from it.

“Before Starbucks became all about gourmet coffee, what did it mean? Before Amazon was an online retailer, what did it mean?” asked Tim Guen, senior brand manager at Irving. “That’s a marketer’s dream, to start with an empty vessel and imbue it with meaning.”

We were hoping that the one-word presentation of Bluecanoe was a typo and the actual name would at least be Blue Canoe, but no such luck. Since the logo treats the two words with different colors to distinguish them, however, let’s consider the two words separately, in which case the name actually does have meaning. It’s very Canadian, evokes a lake somewhere, and it rhymes internally, something that has helped make 7-11 memorable. In its sector, Blue Canoe is instantly memorable and leaves competing gas station convenience store names like Speedy Mart, Quick Stop and Kwik Shop in the dust.

Is the name too dot-bomb-y? It would be if Blue Canoe was an Internet based business, but this is different headspace. It’s important to remember that consumers compartmentalize these things, only processing the names in context. Of the water-based names, this is a good one given the competitive landscape. Nothing like the water foul committed by Sag Harbor, a company that sells clothing to soccer moms. Think about that for a second.