What’s in a name?
The other day I and a few friends had an impromptu debate on whether or not the name of a company really matters to its corporate success. And while each one of us agreed to the fact that in the long run a company with a bad product would never be successful irrespective of its name we did have a few disagreements on whether companies with good products would still be as successful if they had really aweful names.
To Quote from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet
“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet”.
But if it were true about the names of companies, products and services we would’nt see the constant branding and rebranding of products. Just the other day Google, of all companies, dumped the name “Froogle” for a more descriptive name “Google Products Search” while simultaneously dumping the descriptive name “Google Personalized Web Page” for “iGoogle”. To me it made no sense but maybe it was a result of some large scale user group study conducted by the marketing department.
There is however no denying that a catchy name makes a good first impression as well as helps to differentiate a company/product/service from the rest of the crowd. This is more true now than ever when new Web statups keep popping up every day. I came across a handy Web2.0 company name generator here.
Here are a few names that it generated for me. You never know, one of these might be the next Google or youTube:
Devstorm, Wikizu, Nshots, Kizzy, Javu, Babblenation, Buzzlist, Zambee, FiveZ, Wikinti, BlueXS, Chatterspan, Vindu, Babbletags, Skyva, Kilith, Toptags, lueworks, Myfly, Kante
Some times legitimate companies do not spend enough time considering how their online names might appear and what results is an absolute train wreck
Independent Sources has compiled a top 10 list of companies with unfortunate domain names that can easily be misunderstood.
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A site called “Who Represents” where you can find the name of the agent that represents a celebrity. Their domain name… wait for it… is
www.whorepresents.com -
Experts Exchange, a knowledge base where programmers can exchange advice and views at
www.expertsexchange.com -
Looking for a pen? Look no further than Pen Island at
www.penisland.net -
Need a therapist? Try Therapist Finder at
www.therapistfinder.com -
Then of course, there’s the Italian Power Generator company…
www.powergenitalia.com -
And now, we have the Mole Station Native Nursery, based in New South Wales:
www.molestationnursery.com -
If you’re looking for computer software, there’s always
www.ipanywhere.com -
Welcome to the First Cumming Methodist Church. Their website is
www.cummingfirst.com -
Then, of course, there’s these brainless art designers, and their whacky website Speed Of Art:
www.speedofart.com -
Want to holiday in Lake Tahoe? Try their brochure website at
www.gotahoe.com
If Shakespeare lived in our age, he would’nt have written “What’s in a name?” after hearing one of these domain names.
Ritesh said,
May 17, 2007 at 1:42 am
what do you think of memento.com
although its not available…
Ritesh