March 18, 2008
Bear Stearns Naming Especially Relevant Today
One of the things that has occurred to me as I read about the JP Morgan buyout of of Bear Sterns was how a company with the word “bear” in it managed to do so well on Wall Street in the first place? Patrick O’Callahan in the News Tribune wonders the same thing, asking “Why not Bull Stearns, Windfall Stearns or Rally Stearns?”
Names that might be avoided, according to Callahan, would be “Crash Stearns, Panic Stearns, Nosedive Stearns, Sell-Off Stearns, Lemming Stearns and Halloween Stearns.” The Daily Dopeness suggests that the new name might be JPBearBernankeMorganStearnsChase. 
Fact is, they are certainly living up to their name (the first part, anyway).
Then again, Callahan's naming might seem very apt to poor old Bear Stearns today.
Technorati Tags: Naming, Bear Stearns, JP Morgan, Callahan, Buyout
Posted by William Lozito at 7:45 AM
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February 13, 2008
Does TuitionTree Brand Naming Make Sense?
Yesterday, on Trademork, I read something troubling about online loan service LendingTree.
Already facing a class action suit for “unfair business practices and false advertising," it has decided to offer a similar student loan service called TuitionTree.
I do think that TuitionTree is an improvement over the LendingTree brand name but worry that this kind of bad publicity could hurt any venture that ends in Tree. 
Rumory suggests that the entire LendingTree model is doomed anyway.
The next generation of real estate loan engines will be more personalized and will feature Web 2.0 naming like Zillow and Trulia.
Expect to see the same in the realm of tuition searching.
Technorati Tags: TuitionTree, LendingTree, Brand Naming, Zillow, Trulia, Loan Service, Lawsuit, Money Tree
Posted by William Lozito at 8:05 AM
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May 30, 2007
Brand Naming: A Naming Company's Best Friend
Alex Beam has a great column up in The Boston Globe entitled "It's a re-brand new world" that takes a hard look at the prodigious amount of renaming that's going on lately.
He looks at the very intelligent rebranding of Boston University as "Boston's University," a nice step up from "the third great University on the Charles."
He then takes a swipe at the Cingular/AT&T company name change, and goes on to to say: "Boston Scientific just rebranded its troubled Guidant brand of heart devices out of existence. Healthone Care System has rebranded itself as Atrius Health because of a name conflict with a Denver hospital network. Citigroup, Delta Air Lines, and even the Iraq war are all said to be in various stages of rebranding."
And while renaming and repositioning cemeteries, cities, and, indeed, countries (he has fun with Canada's new slogan "Keep Exploring," which I think is pretty good) may seem odd to the casual observer, we do it because naming matters. Slogans matter and even mascots matter.
I'd love to see a debate between Seth Godin and Mr. Beam. Seth just posted a great piece entitled "Naming: Of Renamed Brands and Previous Names." Seth says that in general, use an existing name with a great deal of recognition (think AT&T and Cingular), but change your product name or company name only grudgingly for three reasons:
- A merger makes is a necessity
- You need to simplify your brand architecture
- Your current name has too much negative baggage.
Once you implement the change however, make a clean break with the old name and market the new name aggressively.
Technorati Tags: Boston University, Cingular, AT&T, Seth Godin, Delta Air Lines, Branding, Company Naming
Posted by Diane Prange at 10:39 AM
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May 29, 2007
Brand Naming: Are Bank Names Getting Blander?
According to the International Herald Tribune, big banks are trading up to brand names that reflect a global rather than regional reach to appeal to well-heeled customers who might do their banking in a number of countries.
Thus, Spanish Banco Santander Hispano recently changed its name to Santander and is doing away with the names of the banks it acquires.
HSBC and Citigroup have followed the suit. The danger, according to one exec, is creating "not a global brand but a global bland" as bank brand naming gets blander and more encompassing.
The problem, according to one blogger, is that "good bank brands make bad bank trademarks."
Bank brand naming is getting all the more confusing, as banks expand their reach, often treading on local company names as they do so.
- According to the authors, "once-sleepy, small-town banks suddenly emerging as protagonists in national or even global trademark wars."
- Who, for instance, is the real "First National Bank" or who can claim rights to the name "Savings Bank"?
- Are these generic and descriptive or are they trademarkable?
Bankers also get in trouble for snapping up regional names: as in Winchester Federal Savings Bank vs. Winchester Bank, Inc.
Another blogger has found this out the hard way with the Bank of China; while another bank has hit upon a novel way of getting its boring brand name recognized.
Of course, as bank names get more wishy-washy, the names for bank robbers seem to be getting more panache.
The FBI now seems to be giving names to some of its more flamboyant targets: next time you are making a deposit at your local bank watch out for The Paparazzi bandit and the Panama Hat bandit.
Technorati Tags: Santander, Bank Names, Citigroup, Bank of China, Paparazzi Bandit, Panama Hat Bandit
Posted by Diane Prange at 12:03 PM
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March 15, 2007
Brand Name Recognition: Bad For Chrysler, Good For Legg Mason
Sometimes the only thing worse than nobody knowing your name is when everybody knows it.
It seems that two shareholders want to drop Chrysler from the DaimlerChrysler company name and instead use Daimler-Benz AG, because any reference at all to the ailing Chrysler business is "detrimental to the image of the corporation and its products," wrote shareholders Ekkehard Wenger and Leonhard Knoll in their proposal.
Wenger and Knoll add that people have been making up unflattering nicknames such as "Doting Daimler" and "Daimler-Crisis," and that hurts the brand name reputation.
Gunnar Heinrich, at the 4 Drivers Only blog, added that seeing a DaimlerChrysler plaque on a $134,000 Mercedes-Benz would be upsetting, given the lack of premium-priced status he associates with the Chrysler brand name.
John Neff at Autoblog chimes in, “What does it say about the state of solidarity within your company when you have one half being referred to as an affliction? Not much.” Neff notes that DaimlerChrysler supervisory and management boards will resist the name change, making it rather unlikely. Still, it hurts public relations.
I think it's in Mercedes-Benz and Chrysler's mutual benefit to end their ill-conceived relationship and build their respective brands. Yes, Chrysler has some great brands in its stable.
Legg Mason, on the other hand, has the exact opposite problem as DaimlerChrysler. Legg Mason is an invisible giant, known and respected only by people in the financial management sector but not by the average consumer. This is despite the fact that it is the fifth-largest money management firm in the world.
Legg Mason is about to spend $4 million over the next four months to change that. And not a moment too soon. People in its home town of Baltimore know the brand name, it seems, as well as a few others, including Citigroup, which are in its fold.
The only press they seem to have gotten lately is from some Playboy bunnies, who managed to beat the Bill Miller's Legg Mason Value Fund with their stock picks last year.
Technorati Tags: DaimlerChrysler, Ekkehard Wenger, Leonhard Knoll, Daimler-Benz, Name Change, Brand Recognition, Company Naming, Legg Mason
Posted by William Lozito at 9:48 AM
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February 15, 2007
Citigroup Changes Name, Returns Travelers’ Umbrella
Citogroups’s recent announcement that the company was uniting its businesses under the “Citi” brand name and selling its red umbrella logo to insurance giant St. Paul Travelers was not a surprise to most people.
Citigroup has long needed to present a unified brand name to the world and has done it with the Citi initiative.
The company’s various divisions (which briefly included the original Travelers Group and its umbrella logo) will start using different colored logos all with the recognizable red arc logo. The company names will change to reflect inclusion in the Citi brand as well: Citi Smith Barney, Citi Investment Research and Citi Private Bank. Citi’s legal corporate name, however, will remain Citigroup Inc.
Citi’s return of the famous Travelers umbrella has caused much happiness in Hartford, the original home of Travelers, which had flirted with the idea of throwing out the umbrella altogether as part of its effort to build its brand name via its new parent company, St Paul Travelers Cos under a winged shield logo.
Obviously, common sense prevailed and St. Paul Travelers, after it buys the umbrella for undisclosed millions, is going to change its company name to The Travelers Cos (the stock goes to TRV from STA) and will be using that umbrella logo once again.
Citigroup’s effort to collate its myriad interests under one simple, memorable, and Google-friendly name is a great one, not least because they have also named the local stadium after themselves.
The experience with the Travelers umbrella is a nice lesson in branding: you just cannot trade logos between industries. The umbrella logo says “insurance” to millions of people, not “banking.”
Technorati Tags: Citi, Citigroup, St. Paul Travelers, Rebranding, Brand Logo, Company Name Change, Insurance Branding, Umbrella Logo
Posted by William Lozito at 7:04 AM
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January 15, 2007
Company Names: Will Citi be confused with CIT?
As you may have seen, the New York Times indicates that Citigroup is considering shortening its name to just Citi and dropping the red umbrella from its logo.
I've always wondered how Citigroup and CIT have coexisted in the financial services sector. It seems to me that changing to Citi will only exacerbate the potential confusion with CIT.
Technorati Tags: CIT, Citi, Citigroup, Citicorp, Citibank, Banking, Company Names, Company Naming
Posted by William Lozito at 1:24 PM
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October 2, 2006
Links du Jour 10-02-06
02138 > 90210 - Adpulp informs us that Harvard University spends between $500,000 and $1,000,000 per year defending its name against people who want to use the word “Harvard” for dubious purposes. Interesting downside to being the most recognized university name in the world.
T-Mobile Launches "myFaves" Service, New Branding - T-Mobile is going through some big changes, not least its brand name and a new slogan, “stick together”. They also seem to be using different fonts and typography on the products like myFaves, sold under the umbrella brand name.
Hola Bank! Me Llamo Steve - Here is a really simple way to personalize your bank’s brand name offering: program your bank machines to remember if your customers speak Spanish or English. How easy would that be? It seems to me that this speaks to every aspect of name development — starting with the language of your target market.
Technorati Tags: Intellectual Property, IP, Cellular, Mobile, Banking, Banks, Personalization, ATM
Posted by William Lozito at 11:53 AM
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August 20, 2006
Links du Jour 08-20-06
Heidi Klum Increases Her Brand Equity - Following my recent post about the "body slam" between Elle Macpherson and Heidi Klum comes this interesting piece of information about the Heidi Klum brand name. Bill Tancer has tracked hits on the Project Runway television show and found that Heidi Klum's name is now synonymous with the show's name (in terms of searches at least). An interesting case where the celebrity behind a product actually becomes the brand name itself.- MasterCard Makes a Mini-Movie - They're airing a two minute flick on TNT that is designed to get around ad skipping. A new move in product name placement, where the main character will blatantly use the product in some dramatic situations. They are thinking about serialized two-minute shows that you watch between the shows you actually tuned in to watch. The real star of the show? The MasterCard brand name.
Technorati Tags: Heidi Klum, Project Runway, TV, Television, Elle Macpherson, MasterCard, Advertising, Product Placement
Posted by William Lozito at 9:00 AM
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June 6, 2006
Links Du Jour 06-06-06
- Target is a really powerful...bank? - Target just made the top ten list of credit card issuers, meaning that now millions of people see the Target name and logo when they pay for practically anything. Who would have thought that a retail store could make the same list as Chase, Citibank and Amex? I think this is a breakthrough in retail product naming.
- Meat Loaf Sues Former Collaborator Over "Bat Out of Hell" - Product naming can get big and mean. Meatloaf is claiming the Bat Out of Hell phrase is his, as he wants to use it for the name of his upcoming album "Bat Out of Hell III: The Monster is Loose." The law supports the "user of the mark", and that's Meatloaf, in my opinion, not his collaborator and not his manager.
- Addendum to Ten Questions with Dr. Joseph Chamie - Guy Kawasaki has an interesting pair of blog posts that look at the changing demographics of the U. S. If you plan on doing business in the U. S., you might want to know what segments you and your company name need to appeal to, and where. The answer may be a crucial part of your brand strategy.
Technorati Tags: Target, Chase, Retail Product Naming, Meat Loaf, Demographics
Posted by William Lozito at 8:19 AM
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May 20, 2006
Product Naming: Would You Trust Your Uncle With Your Money?
If there ever was a category where creating an emotional connection with the consumer was particularly important, it's Financial Services. That's why I like the new Tio product name. The company's target market includes Hispanics, who are historically accustomed to dealing in cash.
Who better to trust than your uncle? That’s the Spanish translation for Tio. As you know, family in general is important to Hispanics as well.
TIO Networks, formerly Info-Touch Technologies, a Vancouver company behind one of the fastest growing bill payment and financial services networks in the United States, changed its name to capitalize on the emerging brand recognition of its signature mode of bill payment and financial services kiosks, The TIO Network.
Tio will appeal to the Hispanic community in the U. S. Southwest.
Here are some other recent stories on payment processing and kiosks:
- The Wilmington Star reprints a New York Times story on how convenience stores are installing kiosks to serve as banks for the unbanked.
- The BBC reports on the 360money card, a pre-paid debit card intended to allow people without bank accounts to make purchases over the phone or online.
- A General Electric press release on their CashWorks bill payment and check-cashing kiosks.
- Convenience Store/Petroleum reports on TIO Express, which “enables retailers to accept cash payments for multiple billing partners through a web-based application or through the retailer’s own point-of-sale (POS) system.”
Technorati Tags: Payment Processing, Debit Cards, Bill Payment, Kiosks, Financial Services
Posted by William Lozito at 2:59 PM
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March 24, 2006
Links Du Jour
- SweDish - Is IKEA's Brand Bigger Than Sweden?
- Spend the Right Money on the Right Customers - All customers are not created equal. The community bank spends 70% on customers who cost the bank money!
Technorati Tags: IKEA, Sweden, Money, Bank
Posted by William Lozito at 12:12 PM
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January 25, 2006
Ameriprise to Pay the Price?
The philosophy of our blog is to accent the positive. It is very easy to take pot shots at what others are doing. Anybody can do that. Anybody can practice Schadenfreude.
I have, however, been bothered by the Ameriprise name, the new brand name for the spin-off of American Express Financial Advisors. Whenever I see the TV commercial or read the name, “prise” stands out. For me, it doesn’t convey enterprise, which is the root of “prise,” but it does suggest that I’m going to win some kind of prize in a contest or raffle.
What's more interesting is that if I were Ameriprise, I would worry about the many other companies that share the “Ameri” prefix. There are 2,598 federally-registered brands with that prefix in the category Ameriprise competes in.
One example is Ameriquest, the mortgage company that agreed this week to a whopping $325 million settlement for fraudulent business practice in 49 states. I think it is reasonable for one to assume that there is some confusion among the target market, that Ameriprise was involved with fraudulent business practices.
It is simply very risky to use a brand name that is close to another's that offers a similar service. If I had to guess, Ameriprise was selected more for internal considerations than marketplace considerations. We are all mature and seasoned enough to know that this happens.
Being based in Minneapolis as Ameriprise is, I am rooting for the success of a hometown company; it is just unfortunate that this new entity could not have started with a stronger, more distinctive name “from the eyes of the target market”.
Click on the following links to see what others are saying about Ameriprise:
- Minnesota Public Relations Blog
- Investment Get Info
- The Unofficial American Express and Ameriprise Blog
Technorati Tags: Ameriprise, Ameriquest, American Express
Posted by William Lozito at 10:45 AM
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January 3, 2006
How to Lose the Name Game
Question: What is a sure way for a company that has just acquired a competitor with a beloved name to immediately raise the ire of customers, journalists, employees and pretty much everyone else?
Answer: Do away with that beloved name. People around the world like, no make that love, certain names and won't take a name change.
Case in point? A dispute between the two soon-to-be-merged Korean Chohung and Shinhan banks turned ugly, with workers threatening a walkout if the Chohung name is chucked. The union says if the Chohung name, which is steeped in a century of Korean financial history, is scrapped they will demand the resignation of the chairman and will ask customers to stop using the bank. All this despite Shinhan's studies indicating that people preferred the Shinhan name to Chohung's.
Another example of a company name change due to merging is Marshall Field's and Macy's. Federated Department Stores' market researchers last year advised them to replace the newly acquired Marshall Field's with the Macy's moniker. People are still reeling. One reporter noted that when the announcement was made last September, Chicago "reacted as if it had been ordered to start putting ketchup on its hot dogs."
Check out the comments on our post on this topic with one commenter calling the move "cultural genocide" and another asking readers to sign an online petition to help preserve the doomed name.
The lesson learned is that companies who acquire others should rename with care. Tamper with certain names at your own risk.
Technorati Tags: Merging, New Bank Name, Name Change, Macy's, Marshall Field's, Chohung Bank, Shinhan Bank
Posted by William Lozito at 11:30 AM
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October 31, 2005
Sniffs and Roars Are Hard to Trademark
The European Union's recent refusal to permit a French company to trademark the smell of fresh strawberries on the grounds stated "there is no generally accepted international classification of smells which would make it possible ... to identify an olfactory sign" is a reminder that non-traditional trademarks are still a thorny issue worldwide.
Marketers always must consider alternative advertising methods in an effort to quickly and effectively differentiate their brands from the competition's. I have always felt that smell is a very powerful mean of establishing an emotional connection to a product. Psychologists confirm "scents offer the strongest effects on memory, surpassing sight or sound." Yet trademarking a specific scent is very difficult. Scents are subjective. Could ten random people take a blind sniff test and unanimously identify a certain smell as that of "fresh" strawberries? I doubt it.
The US Patent and Trademark Office requires that a scent be "commonly known," "immediately intelligible to the majority of the public," and can only function as a source identifier "where it has no utilitarian function."
Smell is not the only difficult attribute of a brand to trademark. Other non-traditional trademarks include sounds, motions, tactile marks (one German brewery trademarked its name in Braille) and even holograms. Recently American legend Harley-Davidson abandoned a six-year quest to trademark the throaty roar of its motorcycles. It's not such a crazy idea. Other examples of sound marks include a duck quacking "Aflac" for American Family Life Assurance Company of Columbus, a cat's meow for Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation, and the chimed notes G, E, C for NBC. Nonetheless, only 58 out of 729,000 active trademarks in the United States are sound marks.
Laws around the world vary but as things stand, the law in Europe is very clear: a trademark must be able to be represented graphically and be "precise, self-contained, easily accessible, intelligible, durable and objective". I think for the time being, smells as well as sounds, will remain hard to protect.
Technorati Tags: Sound Marks, Trademarking, Smell Trademarking, AFLAC, NBC
Posted by Alwynn Gilgen at 11:30 AM
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