Your name is the start of a story. What story do you want to tell?
Our naming process helps you create a name that is distinctive, ownable, and most importantly, a strategic marketing asset that reflects your brand.
Naming is one of the hardest things we do. Why? Because of ownability. It’s hard to find a name that isn’t trademarked. So while anyone can throw out some names, creating names that are strategic, distinctive, and ownable is a challenge that warrants an investment.
We approach naming in several distinct steps.
The first is to look at your competitive set to assess where there is white space and what kinds of names (there are many naming conventions) your competitors are using. Are they mostly using evocative names (like Apple), descriptive names (Bank of America), or geographic names (New Yorker)? There are pros and cons to each kind of naming convention.
The second step is to get your input on naming conventions, name themes, and any naming hypothesis you or other stakeholders may have.
Then, thirdly, we move on to name generation and ideation.
Fourth, after generating hundreds of names, we narrow the list and send it to our legal partner to conduct shallow ownability screens. This ensures the names we present to you have a good chance of being ownable, however it does not guarantee it.
Finally we present the shortlist of names. Once you chose one or several the names can be sent for deep trademark review. We can either handle this for you through our partner, or you can use your own legal counsel.
Logo design is a practical next step after a name is chosen—or if you’d like to refresh or modernize an existing logo.
We make sure we understand your preferences, and we can also work within existing design guidelines to create a logo that will continue to work with an already established visual system. Our process ensures you have various options by presenting several logo directions for the same name.
Logo design also pairs well with a visual identity refresh, as the logo is often the cornerstone of the visual design system. If you’re updating your logo, you may want to consider refreshing the entire brand as well.
Create a Name and Logo That’s a Strategic Marketing Asset
Let’s discuss how we can help you create a name and logo that serve as a strong brand foundation.
No. There is no requirement to trademark your name if you prefer not to do that at this time. However, we still advise using our process to do a shallow ownability screen simply to ensure distinctiveness in your industry and also to make sure you do not get into legal trouble by using a name that is trademarked or close to one that is.
Yes, we can review a list of names in several ways—by putting them in a chart that shows them against the competitive set, by doing a shallow ownability screen with our legal partner, and by giving you our professional opinion on how the names align with our best practices.
