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Lenny's 🏦 Vault

Brand Names Build Cumulative Advantage

by David Plasik on June 29, 2025

A distinctive name creates cumulative advantage through repeated exposure and emotional connection, becoming a strategic asset for any product or company.

The Science of Effective Brand Naming

Why Names Matter

  • Your brand name will be used more often and for longer than any other element
    • "Design will change, messaging will change, products will change, but that name is there"
    • Creates cumulative advantage as people see it repeatedly, strengthening the bond
  • A distinctive name provides asymmetric advantage from day one
    • Gives you an edge before you even launch
    • Descriptive names blend in with competitors and limit your ability to stand out
  • Great names create a predisposition to consider your product
    • When consumers say "I don't know much about that product, but I know they're not like the other guys" - that's when you have a winning name

The Naming Process Framework

  1. Identify - Understand behavior and experience

    • Focus on how you want to behave in the marketplace and how you want customers to behave toward you
    • Analyze the competitive landscape to find gaps and opportunities for distinctiveness
    • Create a "creative framework" that opens possibilities rather than narrowing options

  2. Invent - Generate and refine name candidates

    • Use small creative teams (2-3 people) rather than large brainstorming sessions
    • Create multiple teams with different contexts to generate diverse ideas
      • One team knows everything about the project
      • Another team thinks they're naming for a different company
      • A third team works in a completely different context (naming a bicycle instead of software)
    • Apply linguistic principles to evaluate sound symbolism and cognitive processing
    • Generate thousands of ideas before filtering

  3. Implement - Help the name succeed internally and externally

    • Create prototypes showing the name in context (on products, in ads)
    • Develop rationales that explain the strategic value to stakeholders
    • Test with customers to understand how the name fires their imagination

Principles for Effective Naming

  • Seek discomfort and polarization

    • "If your team is comfortable with the name, chances are you don't have the name yet"
    • "There is no power in comfort, not in the marketplace"
    • Look for names that create tension and debate within your team

  • You won't know it when you see it

    • Most clients believe they'll recognize the perfect name immediately
    • Great names often feel uncomfortable at first because they're unfamiliar
    • Evaluate names based on potential rather than immediate comfort

  • Focus on experience, not description

    • Names should start stories, not make statements
    • Think about the feeling and behavior you want to evoke
    • Consider how the name will perform over time, not just at launch

  • Use linguistic principles intentionally

    • Each letter has distinct sound qualities that evoke different feelings
      • V is vibrant and alive (Corvette, Viagra, Vercel)
      • B conveys reliability (Blackberry)
      • Z is noisy and distinctive (Azure)
      • X is fast and crisp
    • Aim for processing fluency - names should be easy for the brain to process

  • Don't obsess over the .com domain

    • The URL has become like an area code - it doesn't really matter
    • Get the right name first, then figure out domain options
    • Consider alternatives like prefixes or different TLDs

Exercise for Finding Your Name

The Diamond Framework for teams without professional naming resources:

  1. At the top: Win - How do you define winning for your company?
  2. Right point: What do you have to win? - Current strengths and assets
  3. Bottom: What do you need to win? - Resources, capabilities you still need
  4. Left point: What do you need to say to win? - Messages that will resonate

Then generate hundreds or thousands of name ideas without evaluating them, looking for those that create distinctive experiences rather than just describing what you do.

Testing Your Name Candidates

  • Ask "What could this name do for us?" rather than "What do you think of this name?"
  • Try the competitor test: "Our competitor just launched with the name X. What do you think?"
  • Look for polarization - if half your team loves it and half hates it, that's a good sign

The ultimate goal is not a "good" name but the "right" name - one that delivers asymmetric advantage and builds cumulative value over time.

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