Customer Reviews

Wordcraft: The Art of Turning Little Words into Big Business

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Alex Frankel, (a true journalist by nature), delves into the murky waters of brand naming to uncover its hidden mysteries. As a former freelance brand namer himself, Frankel set out to interview the top naming firms in the world, to see if there was any systematic method to the madness of naming. What he discovered instead was an odd assortment of colorful characters, each claiming to possess the "gift" or the "method" to creating great brand names. His insights into expensive "top down" umbrella names and viral "bottom up" organic names I found insightful. Some of the quotes by the people he interviews also merit consideration. It was worth the read just to reaffirm that no one can ever corner the naming market with a system or formula; and that good branding requires more than technical, linguistic ability.

After spending more than ten years in the branding and naming industry, it is great to see a good book about how we do what we do. Frankel's book is funny and true to life. Don't approach it expecting to find succint lessons on how to name things but if you pay attention you'll find yourself picking up some insights into the craft along the way.

Frankel is a journalist and also an insider. The result is a fascinating and authoritative look into an industry that most people dont realize exists: the naming industry. The output of course surrounds us in the form of the brands that have become the new vocabulary of our society and our economy. Well worth the read!

Shakespeare may have had us wonder "What's in a name?" but though roses named differently might smell as sweet, they don't have millions of dollars riding on how well a name works. Corporations do, and they know it, and they are ready to pay other companies big money to make sure that the names do more than the job of just being handy labels for their products. Alex Frankel is a business journalist who has actually formed a company to name things for business, and in _Wordcraft: The Art of Turning Little Words into Big Business_ (Crown), he lets us know how this strange and modern facet of global business works. A brand is not just a name but "... an amalgamation of everything that one thinks about when a particular word is uttered." If corporations are spending millions of dollars to make sure that the names that are so familiar (Prozac, Amazon, Cuisinart) can become familiar and can subtly carry extra emotional weight, it is a good idea that consumers get to know a little bit about how we are being influenced (led, manipulated) in this way.

Frankel's book is an analysis of five brand names: BlackBerry, Accenture, Viagra, the Porsche Cayenne, and IBM's e-business, concentrating on the work of the small firms that name the products of big firms for a fee. The world's first naming firm has its own apt name, Lexicon, and it was responsible for naming the BlackBerry, the handheld e-mail device of Research in Motion. "BlackBerry" is a word with an element of fun to it; it is not, by its own nature, tied to e-mail or messages. This represents in some ways a liability; another considered word, "AirWire", might hint of wireless communication, but BlackBerry did not make people think of what the product did. As a result, advertising dollars had to be spent to make the connection, but it proved to be an easy connection to make. BlackBerry was launched in 1999, and every message sent by a BlackBerry was labeled as being sent by BlackBerry, further spreading the name. It became a huge hit at least partially because of the name; some e-mail addicted executives took to calling it the "CrackBerry." The best part of the book is Frankel's depiction of the naming of the products of the pharmaceutical industry, especially the naming of Viagra. Look at that brand name: vigor, vitality, virile are all there. It rhymes with Niagara, the famous destination for newlyweds. (Frankel compares the newer drugs for ED: Cialis doesn't have any particular handle for name interpretation, but Levitra has the "vi" inside it, and it is connected to levitation, getting it up.) Viagra was a made up name that caught on quickly. Phillip Roth lauded it in _The Human Stain_. It got virile spokesmen to say it was a helpful medicine. It even entered the _Oxford English Dictionary_.

Not everything goes so smoothly. One of the chapters here examines the Denver case of the Mile High Stadium, whose naming privileges were sold, so that it is supposed to be known as Invesco Field at Mile High. The public, whose taxes helped pay for the field, didn't like the name, and the editor of the _Denver Post_ refused to allow the "official" name in the sports pages. A bar owner who led a civic protest against the name got elected mayor. There may be larger issues for brand names in the future, as memorable names are manufactured for one product after another; with all that remunerative effort by the naming companies, will we be so inundated with meaning-full brand names that each one will mean less? It is already easy to talk in corporate names; we Xerox documents, or FedEx them, or we Google for them. For now, though, the five different namer-named words examined here are getting business done; they are successfully getting the word out. Frankel has provided an entertaining sidelight on the way corporations do business now, full of juicy anecdotes from executives who take themselves and their naming mission with billion-dollar seriousness.

I will never think of "Viagra" the same way again. Frankel is an astute verbal anthropologist; he takes recent brand names ("blackberry") that have become household words and traces them back to their roots -- back to their early beginnings as ideas in a focus group meeting, scribbles in a whiteboard session, a twinkle in the eye of a member of the word-obsessed "naming" community. The world of creating corporate brand names is both thrilling and terrifying. (You learn how Frito-Lay has teams of scientists who have calculated the precise times of day in which people crave salt or sugar, so the company can play their commercials at the right times.) Frankel, a wonderful wordsmith himself, brings each brand's story alive. He has created the year's must-read book for anyone in advertising, marketing, business, or the business of names.

What a great look inside the workings of the marketing world, for someone like me, who is not in that profession. The personal insight was very interesting and enticing. I want to know how many job offers Mr. Frankel received from this book. I would hire him to help my business-he is so creative and articulate.

Short and sweet, that's how I describe this nice little book about the importance of naming your business and/or products so revenues will be maximized. It also discusses extensively the way in which companies go about thinking up great names for their businesses and/or products.

After a book is written it has to be packaged before it is sold. It can be a wonderful book, but if the cover isn't flashy and the title just right, then sales will suffer. In a way, this book is about the importance of choosing the right title for a book. A book is a product isn't it? But it also talks about titling (naming) businesses, too.

There's really no systematic method to the madness of naming, and we learn this by reading this book. But naming is VERY important just the same. Besides a book full of content on the naming industry, what we get out of this book is five stories describing how big-time successful brand names got started, three of which were BlackBerry, Accenture, and Viagra.

I regularly meet with entrepreneurs in my capacity as a volunteer SCORE counselor. And people starting a business usually don't discuss with me their new business' name. And I rarely raise the issue. It usually is not viewed as an important topic to consider. But after reading this book I think the author makes it clear that naming a business or product is a very important thing to consider when starting a business or developing a product. As a result, I highly recommend that any entrepreneur give this book a read so they can hopefully not hurt their business by choosing a "less than" name.

I would have liked the book better if the Table of Contents had had chapter titles that were more descriptive of the book's content. There are 11 chapters in this book, but known are worth naming here. 5 stars!

If you have work to do in naming -this is such a well written book you are certain to find value from the thirteen bucks. The only danger is considering the development of a name to be the first step in brand development. The process needs to begin with strategic positions. It's not so much about words as ideas. it is in fact possible to develop a brand from the visual representation and get to the name as an implementation of the brand image...

What a great look inside the workings of the marketing world, for someone like me, who is not in that profession. The personal insight was very interesting and enticing. I want to know how many job offers Mr. Frankel received from this book. I would hire him to help my business-he is so creative and articulate.

Alex Frankel is a most inquisitive writer with an engaging and whimsical approach to his craft. He doesn't take himself too seriously, nor does he seem intimidated by ruffling the feathers of big corporate bureaucracies; rather, he sees the humor in their serious endeavors, which in itself makes for an enjoyable study.

I first became a fan of Frankel's after reading his cleverly satirical work, Punching In: One Man's Undercover Adventures on the Front Lines of America's Best-Known Companies, which captures the corporate culture at a handful of household name companies, like Enterprise Rent-a-Car, IBM & Starbucks.

This particular effort explores the brainstorming efforts of companies when trying to come up with catchy names for various products, from Viagra to Porsche Cayenne; the thinking behind the decision making process is a fascinating look at name-branding, and its role in capturing the imagination of the consumer. One false step and it could spell disaster for an otherwise worthy product. The stories he reveals are of the "success" variety, and the stakes are as high as it gets; even those who successfully navigate through the tricky waters of "name branding" are wary of any negative publicity which an irreverent author may spin; however, that's not out of the ordinary when you consider the typical corporate giant is about as humorless and paranoid as a crooked politician.

For anyone with an inquiring mind behind various corporate strategies, and advertising campaigns; this book is certainly a great resource.