Brand naming bewilderment. Last week I received an email from a self-proclaimed ‘young entrepreneur’ on the other side of the world. It requested as follows:
“I will glad if you find suitable name for my company”.
Attached to this missive was no brief, no request for proposal, no mention of budget nor reference to some necessary components such as brand strategy.
Not for the first time, I walked away from my desk and went for a run (a physical expression of my consultancy discomfort, for which 7 miles frankly served no purpose other than introducing a different kind of discomfort). After 23 years in the brand naming game I still wonder why naming has always and probably will always be seen as a free and easy service. To be clear, it’s neither of these things. Absolutely you can find us cheaper or more expensive, less or more experienced – these things are client choice. But it will never be easy. It needs a brief, it needs a naming strategy with criteria and it needs someone who can turn strategy in to creative. These things don’t come for free. Notwithstanding pro-bono work that namers may choose to do.
I started thinking about other things in the brand development process that shouldn’t come for free. Here’s my list for debate, disagreement and creative cud chewing:
Creative pitches
Research
Brand and naming architecture
Brand models – positioning, ‘purpose’ (another debate…) and all the stuff that supports them
Logos and visual identity systems
Website layouts – layout of any application in fact
Internal brand engagement strategy
Comms strategy.
There are other things of course. The point is that no agency or freelancer should be asked to do these things for free and our industry suffers when we do. I think we all have a responsibility to contribute to the integrity of branding, in a world of scepticism. We remain a jolly entertaining media target on occasion don’t we?
As for the inbound email, obviously I asked for further information. Namely status of strategy work, the brand naming brief and thoughts on budget. Still waiting for a response. I reckon there’ll be time for many more 7 milers.
