Are you swimming in an ocean of confusing names?
Now you can turn this mess into a compelling naming seascape, where each name helps you build a stronger, integrated brand ecosystem.

“Connected” Names Can Create a Tsunami of Growth
… and the right brand architecture will create the needed connections. We help you understand how your names should work together to more effectively build your brand. We then craft a naming system to make this happen, increasing each individual name’s power & resonance.
How to connect names?
Names can share a common theme, style, root, letter, or even graphic element to establish the ideal connection.
Apple chose the first letter as its connecting element in 1999, keeping the names short, punchy and “cool” in the process. Over the next 20 years, everyone knew that an iMac, iBook, iPod or iPhone were all from Apple. There were immediate associations of high quality design, ease of use, and excitement every time you heard about a new “i” product launch.
However, naming trends can be fickle, and what works well at one moment in time might fail quickly after the novelty wears off or copycats appear.
When Motorola launched the RAZR phone in 2004, the name related well to its sleek design and generated much excitement and sales. Motorola followed this same style with its ROKR phone a year later; however, competitors quickly copied this cryptic, techy naming style. LG launched its enV phone and other competitors like Samsung and Sony Ericsson had somewhat comparable names. What was once viewed as cool and hip soon became viewed as a fad and dated. Motorola did sell an incredible number of RAZR phones (over 130 million), but its ROKR phone and many competitive cryptically named phone sales didn’t fare as well.
An architecture for “surfing”
Creating a well thought-out architecture and naming system, where names complement one another and fit together seamlessly, will improve everyone’s name “surfing” experience. If the names make sense, they clarify rather than confuse, and customers quickly get a sense you are someone they want to do business with by just scanning your well-named offerings.
However, this is not the typical experience. Almost everyone’s names have developed independently of one another, growing in a somewhat disjoint, incongruent manner over time. Then, perhaps at a conference or during a sales meeting, you realize your names are creating friction and getting in the way more than helping. This is when a naming architecture and naming system can pay off. But it is not easy to implement and typically involves:
- An audit of your naming portfolio which identifies naming scope creep, overlapping targets, inconsistent usage, style conflicts and more
- Interviewing all the key stakeholders (i.e., lack of buy-in is usually the biggest obstacle in executing and adhering to a naming architecture)
- Clarifying brand strategy, naming objectives and degree of integration
- Assessing competitors’ names and identiying underlying weaknesses
- Creating a naming decision tree, guidelines and rationale
- Most importantly: selling the architecture and its advantages internally
What is a brand naming architecture?
Our B2B and B2C brand name architectures are custom designed ecosystems for each client and specify the relationships between all of your names. It provides the guidelines on how to create, structure, and manage names for your products, services, features, and sub-brands. It can validate or provide the rationale for changing your house-of-brands, branded house or hybrid naming strategy. It lays out the relationships among names (e.g., whether products use the master brand name with a descriptor, or have standalone names) and guides how new names should be developed and integrated into your existing portfolio. If done properly, it serves as a flexible blueprint for how your naming system evolves over time and is robust enough to accommodate unforeseen changes. It is a living, breathing organic document that:
- Clarifies Rather than Confuses: Helps everyone internally and externally recognize and understand the hierarchy and relationships of offerings within a company’s portfolio.
- Improves Consistency Over Time: Encourages and rewards standardized naming conventions, styles, and approaches across most but not all products and services.
- Builds Brand Equity: Conveys how each name relates to and benefits from the master brand or sub-brand it is associated with.
- Accelerates Growth: Provides guidelines for naming new offerings in a way that aligns with existing brand structures—helpful when you expand or acquire new product lines.
- Simplifies Complexity: Eliminates the natural tendency of random, ad-hoc naming that can fragment the brand and confuse customers, employees and partners.
Who is the architecture for and what are its benefits?
A well-designed naming architecture is really for everyone including:
- New product development and innovation teams needing to name new offerings.
- Your sales force that needs names to engage prospects quickly and get them to take the next step in the sales process.
- HR or your recruiters that leverage your names to attract and hire new, motivated and talented team members.
- The rest of your employees who take pride in what they produce, what it is called and how it resonates not just with customers but with their friends and family who want to know more about what they do.
- Investors who are looking for exciting names and cohesive naming systems that make sense and drive growth.
The benefits of this type of well thought-out naming framework and guidebooks encompass:
- Improving Brand Recognition & Trust: A cohesive naming architecture helps everyone identify each of your offering’s connections to a trusted master brand or sub-brand.
- Enabling Scalability: As your company grows, adding new offerings or entering new markets, you will need a consistent, strategic approach to naming that can scale easily and reliably.
- Streamlining Legal & Trademark Registration: Having a defined system and guidelines will typically reduce the need for trademark searches and the risk of infringement or diluted naming.
- Facilitating Internal Alignment: A clear naming architecture should empower your employees to communicate effectively about your company’s portfolio and help them name their new offerings appropriately.
How do you create a brand naming architecture?
Here are the steps we will follow to help you construct an architecture that should provide lasting competitive advantage:
- Complete Your Brand Audit: Inventory existing brand names, product names, and any relevant sub-brands and evaluate how they interact, who they are targeted to, their current level of recognition and competitive environment.
- Integrate Your Brand Strategy: Identify your organization’s mission, vision, and long-term growth plans. Also, assess the role of each your offerings: Does its current name reinforce the corporate brand? Is the offering important enough to warrant a standalone brand name? How well does its name work alongside other names it is used with?
- Define Your Naming Goals: Establish what success looks like (e.g., instant reaction, works well with other names, trademark availability, free from any real linguistic issues). Determine how closely linked each name needs to be with a parent brand name and how descriptive or suggestive the names should be.
- Pick & Tailor the Right Architecture Model
- Monolithic/Branded House: All products share the master brand name (e.g., FedEx Express, FedEx Ground).
- Endorser Brand: Sub-brands have unique names but include an endorsement (e.g., Courtyard by Marriott).
- House of Brands: Each product/brand stands alone (e.g., P&G with Tide, Pampers, Gillette, etc.).
- Hybrid Model: Combines elements of two or more of the above (e.g. you might prefer the Branded House approach but don’t want to risk tarnishing your master brand with a new, unproven product so you’ll name it independently of your master brand until it has proven itself in your market).
- Agree Upon Your Naming Guidelines & System: Specify your naming usage templates and nomenclature guidelines (e.g., product names are always two parts with the first part relating to the application and the 2nd part relating to a benefit provided or a unique differentiator). Outline your visual identity or verbal style parameters (e.g., naming character length, language considerations, brand tone).
- Validate & Approve Naming Conventions: Conduct trademark screenings, legal checks, and linguistic tests. Present and “sell” stakeholders (marketing, legal, leadership) on conventions’ advantages to ensure buy-in.
- Establish Branding Leadership & Processes: Specify who owns the naming process (e.g., brand team or naming committee). Provide Decision Tree for future naming requests, renaming and nomenclature “tweaking”.
- Sell & Implement: Present the naming architecture internally (marketing, product, sales, legal, etc.) and answer questions. Make sure everyone understands how to name new offerings or update existing ones consistently.
- Propagate Guidelines & Monitor Usage: Update all internal and customer-facing materials to reflect the architecture. Periodically review new and existing names to ensure ongoing alignment and address any confusion.
- Pivot & Refine, As Needed: As your organization grows or changes direction (e.g., via M&A or brand realignment), tweak your naming architecture to ensure it still supports your consistency and cohesive branding objectives.
Success Stories
Examples of brand naming architectures we have helped create for others.
They spent the time to get to know us and what our organization was about, and what we were striving for. Great group of people bringing a lot to the table even for those not sure of what they want or need yet!
Sometimes a creative team is just the right fit for a project. That was my experience with Namestormers recently, when we used them for a business unit naming project. They listened well, led us through an organized process and came back with plenty of thoughtful, viable options. Thank you, team.
NameStormers helped the client narrow down their list of names, eventually choosing one for their new product. The team was always on time, and they delivered what they promised. Their personal touch and eBook they created at the end to showcase the total work done to get to this point.
NameStormers went above and beyond to help the business select a suitable name while taking into consideration the trademark risks. Their expertise made them a useful resource, and they managed the project well. They were an inventive partner with a well-thought-out process. NameStormers was exceedingly creative.