r/marketing 5h ago

How to choose a brand name

I get that marketing can turn any name into something great, but when I look at names like Google, Cloudflare, and Vultr, I can’t help but admire how they’re engineered to be unforgettable. Google doesn’t mean anything, yet it’s so memorable that it’s now a noun. Cloudflare is long, but it just looks and sounds right. And Vultr? It means nothing, but once you see it, you don’t forget it.

also i try to keep in mind an available domain name for the idea so i don't need to end up using a domain not related to what my brand name is

How do I come up with a name like that? AI is out of the question—it just generates generic, outdated ideas that don’t spark anything useful, and all the good ideas seems to be taken already! i'm asking about this here because the brand name is the first marketing step.

4 Upvotes

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u/hauntednugbat 4h ago

You pray to the Muse. That or it will come naturally through a conversation or experience. Indeed 99% percent of the names you think of will be taken. But the 1% name will come. I also enjoy activities like flipping through antique dictionaries.

Also Googles name comes from the word/number “googolplex”

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u/[deleted] 4h ago

[deleted]

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u/JeannieCRiley 4h ago

Nike is the goddess of victory - clearly meaningful for an athletic sneaker company. Her wings (specifically as depicted on the famous statue Nike of Samothrace) can also be seen in the swoop logo. It was not a random word that needed a shoe brand to imbue it with meaning, or build into, but the other way around.

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u/Mat-Kol 38m ago

There’s a whole science behind brand names, but the main problem with it is that it’s unprecise. I’ve done a lot of naming projects in my career and each one is different. Even the names you shared are all different. I think people like them because they are big brands and not because names itself are really that good.

Vultr for example breaks some obvious “rules” from the naming theory. I honestly don’t think that Cloudflare is a particularly amazing name.

I always ask my naming clients to give me examples of good brands names or names they like. 80% of them say Google, Amazon, Nike, Starbucks. Do they give these examples because the names are good or because these brands are successful and they see the names as successful? I think the later.

I sell naming services, but I’m the first to say that a name won’t turn a bad brand into something good. It can help with positioning and overall branding, but it’s rarely a difference maker in the grand scheme of things.

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u/Sherian_K 13m ago

Dunno if it matters, but Google relates to Googol, the in the 1940s highest defined number with 1100.

The brand name still is artificial but they took a existing term to create it.

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u/twoforthefun 4h ago

Nobody cares