This blogpost is not an exhaustive summary of the book. Just contains the notes I took

SMILE: The 5 Qualities of a Super-Sticky Name

  • Suggestive — evokes something about your brand
  • Meaningful — resonates with your audience
  • Imagery — is visually evocative
  • Legs — lends itself to a theme for extended mileage
  • Emotional —moves people

SCRATCH: The 7 Deadly Sins

  • Spelling challenged —looks like a typo
  • Copycat —is similar to competitors’ names
  • Restrictive —limits future growth
  • Annoying —is forced or frustrates customers
  • Tame —is flat, descriptive, uninspired
  • Curse of Knowledge —makes sense only to insiders
  • Hard to pronounce —is not obvious or is unapproachable