Jay Jurisich radi u San Franciscu i među najboljim je stručnjacima za brendove. Jutarnjem je otkrio što je danas presudno za poslovni uspjeh te zašto će neke hrvatske tvrtke uvijek ostati samo regionalneSve je u imenu. Za jedan brend ništa nije toliko važno kao ime”, poslovna je filozofija Jaya Jurisicha koji je s tom krilaticom prije šest godina s kolegom Steveom Manningom u San Franciscu osnovao kompaniju Igor koja se bavi vjerojatno najzabavnijim, ali prilično unosnim poslom u svijetu biznisa.
Thelen Reid Brown Raysman & Steiner LLP, an international law firm with approximately 600 attorneys in nine key markets, announced this week that the firm will now be known simply as “Thelen” for branding purposes. “It rhymes with wheelin’,” says The Wall Street Journal Law Blog.
Thelen Reid Brown Raysman & Steiner had well-laid plans to rechristen itself with the shorter and catchier “Thelen” but was held up by a Korean cybersquatter. The marketing move, which launched Monday, was threatened by the distant owner of the “thelen.com” domain name. But if there’s one thing a Web entrepreneur should know, it’s this: Don’t register a domain name of a 600-lawyer law firm and expect nothing to happen. “We did get pretty heavy-handed with him,” says Thelen partner Robert Weikert. [via Law.com]
Impotence is now ED and painful bladder syndrome is IC/PBS. Naming specialists brainstorm to come up with innocuous acronyms for embarrassing diseases to be associated with name brand drugs.
And then, pharmaceutical companies have to come up with memorable names for drugs their customers can associate with those syndromes, and ask their doctors if it’s right for them.
It’s the job of drug consultants to create a name that’s not already taken, won’t lead to medical mix-ups and can help cut through the marketing clutter.
What makes a good name?
“A lot of it is more art than science,” said William Trombetta, professor of pharmaceutical marketing at St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia. “There are certain letters that express power and control, like Z, M or P. Other letters, like S, are more passive. Depending on what the drug does, you want to give the name certain features.”
Want to sound high-tech? Go for lots of Z’s and X’s, such as Xanax, Xalatan, Zyban and Zostrix.
Want to sound poetic? Try Lyrica, Truvada and Femara.
Want to suggest what it does? Flonase is an allergy medicine that aims to stop nasal flow. Lunesta, a sleeping drug, implies “luna,” the Latin word for moon — a full night’s sleep.
Then there’s Viagra, the erectile-dysfunction drug made by Pfizer. It uses the prefix “vi” to suggest vigor and vitality. The word rhymes with Niagara, suggesting a mighty flow.
“You know exactly what Pfizer (PFE) was trying to say with that,” said Andy Valvur, senior brand strategist at Igor, a San Francisco branding company.
Drug names can suggest, but under FDA rules they can’t come right out and make medical claims. That’s why you won’t see TumorBeGone or CureAll.
For the latest thinking on naming and branding in the pharmaceutical industry, there’s Better Naming Through Chemistry by Igor.
Next time you find yourself cooped up with a bunch of bored kids some rainy day, fear not. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has put your tax dollars to work creating a treasure trove of online games and quizes that will keep your kids engaged all day.
In the “Mouse Traps” section kids will have fun answering trivia questions like, “Are you limited to only one named inventor on a patent application?” and “Can you get a patent on a design for a holiday ornament?” and ” Do trademark attorneys have to register to practice at the US Patent and Trademark Office?”. In the “Chicken or Egg section“, kids will have hours of fun trying to remember the correct evolution of different product and company logos over the last 75 years!
A Google search for naming consultants serves up both of the following “sponsored links”. The first is from a group of naming consultants that named their company, “Strategic Name Development”, abbreviated in the ad as “SND”:
SND Name Consulting
Exceptional names. Guaranteed.
Strategic and linguistically sound.
www.namedevelopment.com
Underneath Strategic Name Development’s ad is an ad by competitor Namebase (displayed in rotation, so hit refresh if you don’t see it), which asks:
Name Too Descriptive?
Strategic Name Development
Namebase Naming Agency
www.namebase.com
No, it’s nothing nefarious by Namebase. There is no trademark infringement here. Namebase is free to use its competitors “name” in its ad in this fashion, because strategic name development is a generic phrase. Yes, Namebase’s ad is diluting the brand equity of Strategic Name Development’s name, and may be confusing folks looking for Strategic Name Development (the company, not the service), who then click on Namebase’s ad thinking they have found Strategic Name Development (again, the company). But it’s more likely that people who click on Namebase’s ad have found just what they were looking for, strategic name development (the service, not the company this time).
It’s possible that this part of the ad is a competitive jab by Namebase at Strategic Name Development: “Name Too Descriptive? Strategic Name Development”. But probably not. Namebase is not in the best position to play the “Name too descriptive?” card.
Why? Because if you happen to name your business after your family beagle, and you named your beloved pooch Macy, for instance, sooner or later you’re going to get a letter from the legal department of a very large company asking you to find a new name pronto. Then what do you do?
First, plead ignorance: “We didn’t know we were trying to infringe on anything,” said Lisa Wendler, the beagle’s mom.
Second, bite the bullet and change your name–don’t even think about fighting the big company, if they’ve beaten you to the trademark office:
“Paul Wendler said he passed on the idea of contesting the matter with Macy’s.
“All I could imagine was paying enormous amounts of money,” he said.
Smart man.
Finally, move on with a stronger brand than you had before, a win-win for all concerned:
Despite the confusion and need to change their company name, the Wendlers said they have not noticed any drop-off in business.
They’re coming out of the experience wiser.
Choosing a name, they now know, matters and can be costly.
“I can see Macy’s point,” Paul Wendler said. “There could be confusion between the two of us.”
Lisa Wendler hopes that other small business owners won’t overlook the matter of obtaining trademark protection.
“It was a huge lesson that we learned,” she said.
Presumably, Macy the the beagle can keep her name. Macy Gray would not return our telephone calls, but so far appears to have no intention of opening an eponymously named large retail chain, or a floral design business for that matter.
The naming rights to San Francisco’s Candlestick park have been sold. Again. Now it’s up to local voters to decide what to call it. As reported in today’s San Francisco Chronicle:
The agreement, worth at least $6 million over four years, splits the proceeds evenly between the team and San Francisco’s Recreation and Park Department — an amount that one of the deal’s detractors described as “chump change” but that backers said was badly needed for city services.
The deal to rename the stadium Monster Park comes five weeks before San Francisco voters will decide whether to cement in city statute the stadium’s historic name, Candlestick Park, and bar it from being called anything else. The prohibition would extend to a new stadium, too, if one were built at that site on Candlestick Point.
A great name recognition coup for Monster.com, no? Well, no, but ultimately yes. The company that paid $6 million to rename the stadium Monster Park is actually Monster Cable Products Inc, and is completely unrelated to the job search site. But the folks at Monster.com aren’t complaining one bit. With football season in full swing, they just received free tickets to the Monster’s Ball.
About eighty years ago the ruling communists forbade the use of surnames in Mongolia as part of an effort to destroy the political power of the traditional tribal system. It took seventy years for the effects of tens of thousands of people having exactly the same name to get really annoying, so in 1997 a law was passed requiring everyone to choose a last name.
Trouble is, Mongolians are largely choosing the same surname, Borjigin, the tribal name of Ghengis Khan. For more on confusing Mongolian naming conventions, check out the entire article in the Globe and Mail.
Nothing communicates an idea better than a dead language that no one speaks. From MediaWeek:
Centurion Publishing Group has revealed why it chose to change its name to Redactive Media Group after almost 24 years in the business.
Chief executive Brian Grant said altering the company name came at a logical point in its history.
He said: “The Latin word ‘redact’ means ‘to prepare for publication’, and combined with a sense of dynamic activity, this name captures the essence of who we are and what we do.”
Get it? “Redact” + “active” = Redactive. “But wait”, you say, “Is there a risk that non-Latin-speaking mortals may pronounce the preternatural pseudonym “Red Active”?
Fear not. Not only have they figured out that “Redact” is a clearer way to say “Publishing” than, say, the word “Publishing”, but also that treating the logo like this –
– will help the unitiated to de-emphasize the “Red” in the pronounciation, despite their whole website being red. Besides, “Red Active” is a different company altogether, residing at www.redactive.com where ther logo is presented like this:
So next time you think “publishing”, at least one company hopes you’re not actively seeing red.
Tuesday, April 29th, 2008 - 4:19pm |
Igor + advertising + branding + company names + industry insider + language + logo/identity + luxury brands + name changes + naming process + pop culture + powerful names + product names + taglines + trademark issues |
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The naming rights to San Francisco’s Candlestick park have been sold. Again. Now it’s up to local voters to decide what to call it. As 
