Let’s get into step 2 of our naming process, coming up with or IDEATING brand names. In this #tellthetruths video we build on the broader strategy we talked about in the last video (all the videos in the series are tagged below). We find the secret sauce is to generate as many names as possible. Quantity breeds quality, dear people!!
Step 2: BUILDING BRAND NAMES – IDEATION
We share an idea to help you create more names and an anecdote for how coming up with lots of options gets you better work in the end.
This video originally appeared in LinkedIn
If you enjoyed this video, check out:
Step 1: BUILDING BRAND NAMES: STRATEGY
A Name Can’t Be ALL The Things
TRANSCRIPT:
Hey guys, it’s Rebeca with BrandTrue. And I’m here to talk about the second step in building brand names which is all around creative IDEATION. I’ll link down below the video where I talk about all 4 of the steps, and then the video where we take apart step 1 which is strategy.
So step 2 (once you have a strategy you know where it is that you’re going to dig holes, looking for names) is to start digging. And the big secret is the more the merrier. Quantity is the best predictor of quality outcomes, really in any kind of creative ideation. And that’s certainly true for names.
So how do you do that? There’s a lot of different ways. When I talked about strategy, I mentioned that with naming you want to sort of look at a lot of different ways, a lot of different places you can go. Do you want to talk about who the name is intended for? Who the product is intended for or who is the maker or what is the benefit?
Try to think of all the different things you might want to talk about and ideate against them and keep going. Bad names don’t matter. Some of the names that we come up with are utter garbage, but that’s okay because getting them out, getting them out, getting them out. You’re getting them out of the way for the brilliance to bubble up. And definitely don’t have one person working on an ideation challenge. The more people, the better.
You cross pollinate when you see each other’s work. People have different experiences, different things they know. You have no idea who has the best name. Get as many people involved as you can. There are a lot of different things that we do that are our little secrets for how we can get more and more ideas going.
I’m not going to be able to tell you all of them but I’ll tell you this one which is it can be really helpful when you’re running out of ideas to keep going by reverse engineering. Take a look at all kinds of brand names that you like. All different categories. Doesn’t have to be what you’re working in at all. But look at a name you like and think, why do I like it? What did they do that made it clever or memorable, whatever? And then try to apply that to your challenge as well.
I’ll close by saying something I learned the other day that blew my mind that supports this idea of the more the merrier. There was an experiment where they gave ceramics students, they had two sections of this class. One section was told you will get an A if you create one brilliant piece of ceramics you have all semester to create your brilliant piece. If it’s brilliant, you’ve got an A, if it’s damn good you’ll get a B going down the line. The other section was told if you build 50 pounds of ceramics this semester you will get an A, if you make 40 pounds you’ll get a B, on down the line and objectively evaluating their work at the end of the course of the semester, the people that just kept at it and made 50 damn pounds of ceramics had far better work than those that were charged with being brilliant and could make as much as they wanted. That’s how naming is. That’s how creative ideation is. Keep going. Let me know what you think. Bye!
