We use names to identify with People, object and subjects. Brands names are basically the names that have become popular. To come up with is rather simple, if you want to name a baby all you have to do is to go to a baby names website and pick the one you like best, but making brand names are not only tough in practice but even tougher from a scientific point of view. Brand names are in fact scientifically made, coincidentally or not.

The Logical Definition of Brand Names:

Brand Name = Name + Brand Positioning + Strategy + Marketing

Naming:

No matter what your business is everybody needs to identify you some how. But just having a name is not enough, your name should be easy to read and understand; it also has to be memorable and friendly.

Unique names tend to be special since they are new words people have never heard before and any sort of definition you give to it has the tendency to stick. The biggest problem however is unique names tend to be easy to forget unless you have the resources and money to keep repeating it until it becomes a part of natural language. It's hard to come up with unique names, you can mash up a few alphabets together but names also have to make sense. Web 2.0 sites have exhausted the idea that a misspelled word is still a unique name, in my opinion if there is a spelling error in a name it just shows the dumbness of its creators. Flickr was a clever name because it was among the first but every other similar name that came after was really dumb and since the idea was no longer unique and clever it lost its appeal.

How to find a good name?

To find a good name first make a list of keywords. By keywords i mean words that mean want your name is trying to represent. Categorize each keyword into definition groups, so if you have a whole bunch of keywords but 5-6 of them basically mean "inventive" then create a group called "inventive" and put all the keywords associated with that meaning under that group. Next find as many COOL words that are also synonymous with "Inventive" by looking into thesaurus part of dictionary, also don't forget to look into other languages to find cool translations.

When you have lots of words that seem to be cool enough start the word play. Playing with words involves mixing up words that are in the same category or in the contrasting category, manipulating words, cutting words into pieces and matching them with other pieces from other words. The list goes on. The goal is to come up with at least 50 new words.

To make sure your new names are easy to read try to read them out loud your self and ask others to read it out loud as well. If you find that you have to correct others in pronunciation then there is something wrong with that name. Forget fixing up words at this point. you have lots of names to go through. The words that pass the "read" test move on to "understandable" test.

To see if your new name is understandable, ask people to see if they can guess what the each word suppose to mean. Better yet, ask them what is the first thing that comes into their mind. Narrow the list down to those words that convey the some what original meaning.

You list should be very short by now, i'm guessing we are down to about 5 to 10 from 50. You next goal should be to narrow it down to 3. Sometimes it's a matter of taste or a hunch, no matter how you decide to narrow down the list the important thing is that you as the new owner of the name can totally relate to them name.

When you have you top 3, it's time to do some more research. If your name is going to be a global player then it has to have safe meanings in all of the popular markets. I have my own way which is a proprietary way used in the industry and i can't disclose it yet, i can't bite the hand that is feeding me. But i will give you an example, There is a clothing company in Canada and it's called ROOTS, when the Olympics was held in Australia, ROOTS was the clothing sponsor for the Canadian Team, Little did they know in Australia ROOTS means having sex. The ROOTS name was ridiculed all over the world, it was a disaster for the brand name because it was opening locations in Europe and Australia and after what was thought to be a great investment ended up forcing the company to abandon its plans and invest in only North America.

Back to conclusion, After you've done your research on all your top 3 names then now is the time to pick one. But before you pick that 1 special name consider the following:

• make sure .com domain of that name is available
• finalize any changes to the alphabetical structure of the name
• search the trade marks database to make sure the name is available
• search google to see if anybody else is using the name and what are they using it for
• make sure the name has a clean, safe and trusting meaning

Now you have a name, good luck!

Brand Name = Name + Brand Positioning + Strategy + Marketing
 

i've been engaged in quite a few conversations in the last couple of weeks regarding strategy and process involved in constructing web projects. We all have different methods of practice, we do things differently based on the orientation that is most comfortable to us. Notice in none of articles so far i have tried to push for a single way of doing things but i've been trying to lay everything out on the table and let you chose your own methods.

There are a lot of blogs, magazines, and books that talk a great deal about how to build a great looking site, or a successful site, blog whatever. Everybody has his/her own way of doing things and just because they saw great results doing it their way doesn't mean it work the same for you as well.

before i launched this site, during the time i was still thinking about the design and what kind of CMS i should go with, i researched, bookmarked and printed out most of these articles (i plan to release my entire sources this weekend), and I found out that each person walked a different path that seems different but has a lot of things in common with another person but at the same each path was engineered, by accident or not, to fit each individual's unique situation.

Each article in one way or the other emphasized the process that got them to where they are now, which is a great deal of success. So while i was reading all these articles i started picking out the ideas that i liked best, i did not choose based on performance but based on my own personal abilities, I even became as brave as tweaking some of the ideas. Before i knew it i had so many plans and ideas for making a great site that i needed 10 of me to do it.

Doing everything you want to do takes time and effort and sometimes it takes so much effort that you can't psychically do it by yourself. Since i had no help i decided to divide my process into phases, i ended up with 5 phases in total. Right now i'm at phase 1, and i'm only %20 through the process.

The point is, there are lots of great articles out there, keep reading them and take notes but don't pick one and bank all your money on it. As our Wall St. friends always say "Never put all your eggs in one basket"

here are some great sites to get you started with, i promise to have a great list of articles soon.

ProBlogger - self explanatory

DoshDosh - blog and SN marketing

HipMojo - great set of blog/project articles

Will Price - about blogging and creating traffic

Smashing Magazine - blog and blog design articles

I love Typography - content in essence is typography

A List Apart - I think everybody knows this one already

Andy Rutledge - probably better than "A List Apart" wink!

Seth Godin

Brand Autopsy

Branding & Marketing

Buzz Marketing for Technology

Conversation Agent

Web Ink Now

Entrepreneur's Journey - The name says it all

BNet - Business Management Articles

Get Rich Slowly - Knowing your finances is just as important as knowing your CSS/HTML

Simple Dollar - Another finance/saving blog

 Above though a lot of links are still a small fracture of my own resources for wishing to get somewhere on this internet. I know i can because i've made plans and have calculated every step of the way but this how i do things in general, also in part it's my job.

I hope this little blog article give you the hope and motivation to start researching your own next big break! remember we can only make it happen for ourselves, nobody is going to hand a successful business you have to fight for it.