Comments on: Apple’s not-so-secret branding advantage

By: Kevin Forssmann

Kevin Forssmann — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 08:14:39 +0000

Apple´s naming strategy just grabs people by the throat whereas Nokia´s naming strategy is not as cool.

Names should become more human. They have to. Not just to secure trademarks and domain name registration but to compete against other products that already have adopted bold names, like Apple.

People want to understand and relate to product brands and Nokia´s naming strategy is seen by consumers to be cold, and difficult to remember.

But how do you name a portfolio of over 60 different phone models?

By: MIke Abbink

MIke Abbink — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 17:17:09 +0000

To comment on Nokia , the naming they use is not really brand strategy driven, but more engineering and requirement driven. There approach is not on purpose. it’s a complete mess and they know it. They struggle with this internally and cannot come up with anything else at the moment. I know this from working directly for them and dealing with these issues in the retails stores they launched. The four clusters Luz speaks of were reworked recently and are now 1. Business 2. Multi-media 3. Originals 4. Lifestyles. These were developed by our very own Jeannie and Eric while they continued to work for Nokia at Eight Inc. To get them to do this change was a painfully long process apparently as it needed to go through many approvals etc, etc. People are loyal because it’s a good product, not because they like the naming. If they were to have a more likable naming convention i would venture to say the loyal customer would become even more loyal.

By: Aaron Vaughn

Aaron Vaughn — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 03:56:06 +0000

This is so true, Apple Inc has a brutally simple brand philosophy and experience that extends from its products through to its advertising, logo type, store design (e.g. the cube store in NYC), and even its website. Apple Inc’s website homepage is so simplified it just has one big center picture and ‘learn more’ links. Apple’s philosophy is: ‘highly advanced technology that is simple to use and that just works’.

P.S. Who designed Saffron Consultant’s website? It is rather interesting, especially for a brand consultancy!

By: Peter

Peter — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 18:50:14 +0000

Ooh. Big type…

One difference between Apple and the “other guys” you talk about is that Apple limits features on their devices.

Consider a recent example: If you want a MacBook with a FireWire port, you’re out of luck. Buying a Macintosh is usually about trade-offs. “Do I really need FireWire so much that I’ll spend another $400-$700?” You usually have to settle one way or another (eg, buy a more expensive machine or go without something you want). Because, let’s face it, what are you gonna do? Go buy a Windows machine?!

The Windows world, of course, is much different. Margins are lower and volume is king. Dell can’t afford to have a customer even consider buying an HP machine. Dell must offer a solution for everything you would need. That means they have to offer far more choices in order to compete. So Dell doesn’t really get the luxury of using cute and clever names that the customer can relate to because their product catalog would look like a Webster’s Dictionary.

By: Luz Erhardt

Luz Erhardt — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 15:58:04 +0000

As an Apple fan I cannot but agree with you here Seth. But for the sake of argument I dare say that this is not necessarily THE approach.
Indeed Nokia has an impossible to remember product naming system, but it’s surely on purpose. Nokia users are precisely that, Nokia users. They might have a preference for the 5110 or the N8970, but they’re not loyal to the phone, a mere device, but to its provider. And oh, are they loyal!
For a company that produces more mobiles a year one could imagine it’s impossible to build on emotional names coherently. Their strategy has been to arrange their mobile production in 4 clusters – 1) business, for pros 2) innovation, for techies 3) connection, for basic users and 4 )style, for fashionistas – and develop a pile of number series for each.
… the battle has started, who will win?