Ask a brand agency to work on a name for a brand and they will shudder. Creating a brand name is one of the biggest challenges for anyone, especially if you are not the one who owns the brand. Its possible that you could end up with about a hundred options which will all be rejected and the hundred and first option, which probably has been suggested by the client herself and is also probably so meaningless will be the one that gets the green signal.

But the good news is that just names do not matter much in the long run. Unless of course it is completely whacked out like perhaps calling a dairy brand after a reptile species or something that literally has no connection to the product attributes.

Imagine a futuristic technology company asked you for a name for its brand and you suggested the name of a vegetable. Pea. Pea Tech. Chances are the client’s going to look at you like you were out of your mind, or maybe think that he was out of his mind for giving you that big down-payment towards your intellectual services. You should probably remind him that over 25 years ago someone suggested that a future technology giant be named after a fruit and they bought into it. Apple. The rest is history.

Several contemporary agencies today try and get cerebral with naming and start giving ‘nomenclature directions’ to come up with names that reflect ‘the brand essence’. A very good idea. Especially if the client jumps approves it at one go, or maybe the second go. But the corollary to this thinking is that Albert Einstein’s mother was given naming directions on science and mathematics to come up with the name of her son. We don’t think so. Albert Einstein lived his life as a brilliant scientist and therefore his name is now a brand associated with brilliance, intellect and science. You could name your kid Albert Einstein, and there’s a good chance that little fellow may end up being anything but all of these.

A name is not the most important thing for a brand. The collective brand experiences and consumers connection with it will make the name associated with a particular brand essence.

So the next time a client says he’s already got a name for his brand, quickly and silently heave a sigh of relief, and move on to focus on what the brand should stand for.