The Pollywog Blog

The Star Tribune reports on a feud between the Susan G. Komen “Race for the Cure” and small nonprofit also dedicated to fighting breast cancer. In a formal opposition to a trademark registration, Komen claimed that the Minnesota-based group’s name–“Mush for a Cure”–was confusingly similar to its own registered trademark. The all-volunteer sled-dog race fundraiser was only one of dozens of groups earning Komen’s enmity because their name contained “for a cure” or “for the cure.”

Ultimately, Komen dropped its opposition to “Mush for a Cure” and a New York group named “Kites for a Cure” after their stories garnered national attention on NBC News. The USPTO has seen fit to grant “Mush for a Cure” a trademark registration.

What can we learn from this story?

And that last point is good advice for all organizations–for-profit and nonprofit alike–because a shorter, distinctive and creatively unexpected name performs better in a crowded marketplace than a longer descriptive one.

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Animal welfare advocates agree: The best way to reduce the heartbreaking volume of animals euthanized by overcrowded shelters is to prevent unwanted litters.

But when times are tough, a lot of pet owners can’t afford to neuter their animals, which ultimately results in more unwanted litters.

To address this problem, the Animal Humane Society (AHS), the leading animal welfare organization in the Midwest, teamed up with a local veterinarian to introduce a subsidized spay/neuter service for low-income pet owners, delivered by way of two mobile surgical units. Pet owners can sterilize their dog, cat or rabbit for a fee ranging from $35-$100–a substantial discount over regular veterinary costs.

AHS asked Pollywog to lead the naming of this new service. Because sterilization surgery is key to saving more animals–and because the service is made possible through the generous donations of strangers–we recommended “Kindest Cut.”

Logo and brand identity were created by our friends at Sussner Design.

We count it a privilege to work on such an important cause and look forward to partnering with the Animal Humane Society on future projects.

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From the It’s Nice To Be Noticed Department comes this—a thoughtful (and completely unsolicited!) response from someone who really understands what the Sprockets brand can do for the community:

Mired in a series of budget cuts, union issues, declining enrollment and a persistent and staggering gap in achievement between student groups, the Sprockets “power name” provides a very strong platform and hopeful ray of sunshine that the strife-ridden local education environment can use as a flash-point to spark a fresh approach to things.

Let’s hope that in addition to engaging and inspiring struggling students in our urban education environment, the vibrant, value-add of the Sprockets brand can give a much-needed extra-curricular boost to the tone and essence of the struggling district leadership as well.

Katherine Emmonds is a Minneapolis-based writer who specializes in civic engagement, education, science, the arts, innovation and creativity. Thanks for the kind words, Katherine!

You can read the rest of Katherine’s blog post here.

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How do you increase high school graduation rates by more than 90%? Get kids to keep learning, even when they’re not in school.

And how do you do that? By offering them such a wide range of learning opportunities, they can fill their out-of-school time with activities they love–and in so doing, find out what they’re really good at.

That’s the idea behind a new initiative from the City of Saint Paul. The program coordinates the city’s many existing resources to offer kids hundreds of free or low-cost activities and programs, from art to basketball to reading to music to math tutoring.

Key to the initiative’s success was its brand, which had to be youthful (but not too young), fun (but not flippant), and somehow communicate the idea of an interconnected network (without being complicated).

Pollywog led a diverse group of influencers and decision-makers–including the Mayor’s Office, school board, library system, parks and recreation department, Youth Commission and students themselves–through the branding process to give this innovative program the energetic, youthful name it deserved, along with an aspirational tagline.

Sprockets. Find out what moves you.

The brand identity–and this cool little spot–were created by our friends at Peggy Lauritsen Design Group.

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What makes some movie titles work and others fall flat?

Read this interesting interview with movie marketing specialist, Matthew Cohen, and you’ll discover a lot of common ground with traits that make brand names powerful.

It should come as no surprise that what works in a brand name also works in a movie title. That’s because the human brain processes information the same way, regardless of industry. Jane the movie-goer has the same brain as Jane the grocery-shopper and Jane the executive decision-maker.

Yet too often, brand creation is restricted by artificially constructed silos, and marketers believe that brands in certain industries must have a certain type of name.

Packaged goods have one type of brand name. Nonprofit organizations have another. Law firms have their own prevailing naming convention. And B-to-B services have yet another.

Certainly there will variations in tone and personality, depending upon audience makeup in these various industries. But the broad concepts of what makes a name powerful hold true across all of them.

Why? Because only in the movies do people have more than one brain.

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John Medina has done humankind a huge favor. In his book, Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School, Medina synthesizes a body of scientific knowledge in a concise, comprehensible and yes, even entertaining fashion.

There’s a mother lode of information here that can be applied to branding. (I marked so many pages with Post-It Notes that my copy of Brain Rules looks like it’s sprouting yellow hair.) What Medina reveals about the brain’s functionality ought to be a primer for anyone creating a brand.

Brain Rules is grounded on 12 facts about how the brain works. This is research that most people never see, Medina says. “We don’t know everything, but ‘brain rules’ are things we know for sure.”

What are these proven facts, and how can we leverage this knowledge to create more powerful brands?

Medina provides many applicable ideas for improving education, but fewer for marketing and advertising. I’ll pick up where Medina left off by quoting some key ideas and suggesting the implications they may have on branding.

There’s a lot to cover, so this will be a series of blog posts. As not all of Medina’s 12 Brain Rules are directly applicable to brand creation, I’ve taken the liberty of renumbering those I’m writing about.

Brain Rule for Branding #1:
“We don’t pay attention to boring things.”

How many ads is the average person exposed to every day? Nobody really knows for sure, but estimates range from 1500 to 13,000. Even at the low end of the estimate, that’s a lot of competition for a customer’s attention.

So when you’re creating a brand, it’s essential to remember that the human brain is hard-wired to ignore most stimuli. Without the ability to select what we pay attention to, we would be overwhelmed with information.

And if our brands don’t capture attention, there’s no opportunity for gaining someone’s interest or, better yet, committing the brand to memory.

Why do some brands command attention and others don’t? More in my next post.

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Pollywog founders John Stucker and Devon Thomas Treadwell appeared this week on Business Radio AM1570′s Peter McClellan Show. Among the topics covered: What makes a brand name powerful? And why does today’s competitive market require a new approach to naming and branding?

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Seattle-based Starbucks unveiled a new logo yesterday to divided reviews in the branding community.

The new logo eliminates the name completely, relying only on the iconic mermaid image to identify the brand.

Some branding experts consider this move a savvy adaptation to a changing media environment. Says Kevin Budelmann, president of Peopledesign:

‘There is an ongoing desire to simplify graphic identities so that they can be more portable into different kinds of media spaces. Today people thinking about new graphic identities are thinking about facebook icons and Twitter icons just as often as stationery or business cards.”

Certainly. But that has never precluded a brand identity from having a simpler version of a logo for such instances. Pepsi, for example, uses its circular mark as an icon when it suits and its full name/mark lock-up when it doesn’t.

I have two issues with the stripping away of the Starbucks name from its logo. First, a customer’s brain now has fewer points of connection to the brand. While we learn and remember best through pictures, text provides its own form of symbology.

More troubling is speculation that dropping “Starbucks Coffee” from the logo signals that the company intends to move the brand into adjacent, non-coffee spaces. While it’s true that Starbucks has always been more about the experience than just the coffee, its brand perception can only move so far without damaging its core.

Starbucks will always be associated with coffee. While the company may attempt to extend the brand into other types of foods, it does so at its own peril.

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A blog post today on a site targeted at new mothers notes a trend toward naming babies after luxury brands.

This practice is, and always has been, relatively commonplace. But what’s interesting is how “Chanel” has recently appeared on the list, at number 139 for girls. “Dior” is number 148, and “Armani” is number 150 for boys. All are luxury fashion brands that make products no one would mind owning.

As a branding professional, I should be delighted, but I find this disturbing. Maybe it’s because I’ve seen how once popular brands can slide down the rabbit hole to obscurity (Pan Am, Studebaker, Burma-Shave)–or worse for a child, uncoolness (Jordache, Levis, Members Only).

Or maybe it just reminds me too much of Idiocracy’s U.S. President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho.

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A generation ago, South Korea was an impoverished nation whose economy relied primarily on agriculture. In 1960, Korea’s per capita gross national product was less than the Sudan’s and not even one-third the size of Mexico’s.

Today, Korea enjoys the world’s 13th largest economy–a transformation so dramatic it has been called “the Asian miracle.”

Initially, Korea scrabbled out of poverty by imitating the technological advances of other nations and selling me-too, low-cost products. But its recent explosive growth is attributable to a systematic, sustained and government-supported focus on innovation.

Korean innovators often receive financial aid from public sources, but now many small and medium enterprises (SMEs) say what they need more than money are the intangibles, including branding.

Miga Medical is one such company. It developed a product that purportedly reduces the size of the human waistline and named it, “N-Body.”

As reported by JoonAng Daily, “the company took six years to develop the product but only spent six minutes to pick a name for it.”

A Miga Medical executive ruefully admits, “We put tremendous effort into developing the product, but were neglectful in naming the brand. Promoting the brand name was a mess. Even employees here don’t really know the meaning of N-Body.”

Miga Medical sought the expertise of Seoul branding agency, whose president Kim Wang-gi says that this is not an uncommon problem among SMEs.

“So many SMEs have been developing outstanding products, but have failed to commercialize them because of poor brand names. That’s the reality of SMEs today,” Kim said.

“A brand name that intuitively and easily tells the product’s functions is crucial.”

Unfortunately, branding also gets the short-shrift from many U.S. entrepreneurs in their rush to market. Many mistakenly believe that naming should be easily handled in-house because, after all, they’ve successfully named their children and pets, so why not their brand? (Apparently they have not yet wandered in the trademark jungle in search of an effective name that’s also available for trademark.)

Others may consider it an intangible that’s not worth paying for. They’ll spend thousands on a Web site that will need to be overhauled in a few years, but won’t invest in a name that will affect their business for the life of the brand.

Branding is an investment, and an effective brand will deliver ROI for years to come. A weak or meaningless brand will be a drag on business forever.

Small- and medium-sized businesses in Korea are figuring this out. We hope more American innovators will too.

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