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Rivkin & Associates Home The Naming Workshop Creating New Names
 
A quarterly report on the strategies & tactics of naming, produced by
Rivkin & Associates LLC, a marketing and communications consultancy
Giving “Resort” the Boot
A rotten recession makes business leaders super-sensitive about where they book their big meetings and conferences. Especially when it comes to the “R” word – no, not “recessi...
Fix the Product, Then the Perception
Business is off 40%. You lost $9 million last year, compared with a $7 million profit the year before. Average age of your customers is up to 73, from 68 a decade ago. It w...
A Little Gold Man We Know as “Oscar”
Who will win the Oscar? It’s Academy Award season again, and movie buffs everywhere await the results of the annual competition. That’s not Oscar Wilde or Oscar Hamm...
Some Things Just Aren’t for Sale
A nonprofit hospital in Indiana took heat after it paid big bucks for the naming rights at a local minor-league baseball stadium. An elementary school in New Jersey sold its g...
It’s a Bird, it’s a Plane, it’s Azul
One thing about creating a new company and running a contest to name it: You’re free to interpret the contest results any way you want. JetBlue founder David Neeleman is s...
Getting Employees on Board with a Name Change
So you’re changing your company name. The old Stafko Products Corporation is now Simplex Corporation. You’ve thought about Wall Street, your customers, your suppliers. What...
 
It’s the Cadillac of … (Fill in the Blank)
“It’s the Cadillac of crossovers,” said the ads from Cadillac as it introduced its SRX vehicle for 2010. No longer is Cadillac merely a century-old brand name. Over...
LOOKALIKE, SOUNDALIKE MIX-UPS IN DRUG NAMES
Are you taking the generic drug Clonidine for high blood pressure? Make sure you don’t leave the pharmacy with Klonopin, which is for seizures. Or Colchicine<...
Searching a Name on Your iPhone
We normally leave software reviews to the techies. But this new “app” is remarkable in its usefulness and simplicity. Nomina is a new application for the iPhone. Plu...
Where Do Bands Get Those Names?
10,000 Maniacs. The B-52s. Buffalo Springfield. Cream. The Doors. Bands find inspiration for their names in literature, film, places, other people, dreams, cartoons, the bibl...
 
Naming the New Decade: And the Winner Is …..
The new decade of the 2010s has barely begun, but already an enterprising Australian has stepped forward to give it a name. Actually, you can blame an Australian news websi...
Name Recognition Tops Taste Perception
Brand names taste better. That’s the conclusion from a savvy study of peanut butter and consumer choice. The details were first reported years ago in The Journal of Con...
MULTILINGUAL SUITABILITY: Q&A WITH ELISABETE MIRANDA
Estee Lauder was set to export its Country Mist makeup when country managers there pointed out that “mist” is slang for “manure.” Oops. The product was re-branded Co...
Trademark Trends: Q&A with Glenn Gundersen
Trademark applications can be a crystal ball of branding. New applications provide a glimpse of the buzzwords and themes that marketers believe will appeal to tomorrow’s consu...
 
The Making of a Name
By Steve Rivkin & Fraser Sutherland
The secrets of successful brand names— who makes them; why they’re made; and how they’re compiled, bought, sold, and protected
Rivkin & Associates Home The Naming Workshop Creating New Names
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