David Placek

Compounds like Blackberry, Powerbook, and Windsurf are multipliers of association. Wind brings one cluster of images, surf brings another. 1 + 1 = 3. That's why clients who resist compounds are leaving value on the table.

Stop evaluating names. Speculate instead. Human psychology makes us ask 'what's wrong with this?' — but great naming requires suspending judgment and asking 'what could we do with this?'

When we asked consumers about a name and they said 'I don't know much about that product, but I know they're not like the other guys' — that's when we knew we had a great name. It creates a predisposition to consider.

Don't ask people what they think of your name. Ask: 'What do you think this name could do for us?' That's the better question. You want to understand what the name fires in their imagination, not whether they're comfortable with it.

The .com doesn't matter anymore. A URL has become an area code — nobody cares if you're in 415 or 615. Get the right name first. The .com can be solved later.

Use a decoy competitor test: Tell a friend 'Our competitor just launched and their name is [X].' Their reaction tells you exactly what that name does — not whether they like it, but what it makes them imagine.