Saturday, March 28, 2015

BRAND NAME SPECIAL ...............WHAT'S IN A NAME? E-LOT, THEY SAY

WHAT'S IN A NAME? E-LOT, THEY SAY


One Spring evening some years ago, in a moment of alcohol-induced exuberance, two friends decided to set up a fast-food business. Fed up of the burgers and pizzas on offer in the market, they decided their baby would sell the very Indian kathi-kabab rolls instead.
The branding was a product of former McKinsey employee Jaydeep Barman and Kallol Banerjee's long-standing annoyance: “Fanatic Activism Against Substandard Occidental Shit“, or Faaso's. The sundowners at Kallol's Pune residence had hit home.
“We didn't do any market research to zero in on a name. We didn't want typical names associated with pizzas and burgers,“ said Barman, who, during his London years, had badly missed the desi grub.“When we opened our first restaurant in Pune, people went `What the hell is this?' The name built curiosity and intrigued them,“ he said.
`Naaptol.com' too had its genesis in fluid, though of a less potent variety.Launched by IIT Kanpur-Minnesota University grad Manu Agarwal in 2008, the name stuck to Agarwal's mind during a swim. “We started off as a comparison portal where consumers could `naap' and `tol' to decide which product to buy . Our underlying mission and vision remains unchanged -to give consumers only win-win deals,“ Agarwal said.Quirky names, often with a distinct grassroot connect, are by now well-entrenched in the Indian business scene. The trend has been pronounced in the e-commerce world. Shaadi.com, Naukri.com, Quikr.com, Myntra.com are popular examples.
The connect with the target audience is almost immediate, with recall value as bonus. Like Harish Bijoor of the eponymous brand consultancy firm put it, in the e-commerce space, brand name is everything as there is no physicality . For instance, nobody had heard of Foodiebay .com until it was rechristened This is unlike the brick & mortar space, Bijoor says, where you can get away with names that are not so distinctive, meaningful or oblique. Some look for English words and translate them like aam.com. For instance, a portal for those considering a “second marriage“ goes Secondshaadi.com.
“When an enterprise is launched in India, the targets are Indian customers and the Indian diaspora which appreciates Hindi. Some also opt for regional languages like a Gujarati name, which again is an attempt to appeal to a particular group,“ Bijoor said.
Trendy apparel retailer Chulbulstore.com, for instance, means naughty and mischievous in a playful way . It is a catchy , hardto-forget name, says founder Vivek Pathak.
Companies, in their quest to be memorable, have in the past named brands after their founders, positive thoughts, places of origin, colours, gods and business descriptions. Tata Salt, Birla Cement, Bajaj Fans, are obvious examples, besides Thums Up, Kalyani beer and Maruti.
Jessie Paul, founder of Paul Writer, a marketing advisory firm, says as long as a story can be told to connect the consumer with the name, company or product, they will remember it. As four-letter combinations and most meaningful English words are either already in use or have been squatted upon, new firms have to get creative.Indic routes are an advantage as these domains may still be available compared to the much higher demand for English names.
“It has become harder and harder to find words that can be registered; hence, the outburst of creativity . If you plan to address a global or even pan-India market, the best names are those that make sense in multiple languages, short and phonetic spellings,“ Paul said.
“By next year, even these hatke but meaningful names would have been used up and we'll be seeing catchy words combined with old favourites like `super', `India', and `online',“ Paul said.
The naamkaran ritual has never been so interesting.
Reeba Zachariah & Harish C Menon

TOI22MAR15 

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