Wagwee, Zoosk, Hibu...

Ah, Wagwee that’s a good one. I wonder if it’s still available?

I used to work for a company called Yellow Pages, you might have heard of them. They did pretty much what it said on the can, they published yellow telephone directories, lots of them and very well. Some of you might remember telephone directories; they came in two colours; the yellow ones which were full of advertising and the white ones which contained almost everybody’s landline number. I know… I know… why would you want a book of telephone numbers when you can programme them into your phone and why would you need advertising in a book when you can just Google what you want? Oh yes, and what’s a land line anyway?

A long time later, when Yellow Pages needed to broaden their not very broad horizons, they became YELL and yes, much as I didn’t really like the name change, I did understand both the need and the rationale. Recently though YELL changed their name again, this time to Hibu. What bu? Hibu? Yesbu - and no, I don’t have any  idea what it means either. Maybe it’s just one of those words that pop up when you are trying to respond online, you know the ones that are randomly generated to prove that you are not a robot.

Wagwee
BrFsz
PAdqim
FarWee

HiBu

I’m always interested in brand names that are ‘different’. It makes me wonder how the company came up with the name, and what it was intended to stand for – but Hibu? Maybe some big-hitters around a table came up with the Hibu name. I can imagine that meeting now…

“We need something new, something radical, something that shouts ‘cutting edge media’, a bit Japanesey, a bit Dali Lama-ish. I see fields of Himalayan butterflies fluttering over the rice fields… maybe it could even become a dance craze… I know… Hibu! Come on guys get on your feet and let’s do the Hibu!”

Let’s leave them happily Hibu-ing away into total obscurity shall we?

Mindu (look there’s one for the future) meaningless company names seem to be all the rage these days. Just look at Zoosk, which has nothing to do with caged animals. Zoosk has been around since late 2007; it’s the world’s largest online dating community and Facebook’s #1 dating application. Some might argue that it’s a great name, whatever it is or isn’t meant to mean.  It’s certainly short and punchy and better still it starts with an unusual letter; the last letter of the alphabet which would have been certain death in the directory world. Of course in the online world of the search engine that matters not a jot.

Yes, Names don’t need to be anything anymore because it isn’t the name that’s important; it’s about the keywords that drive you to the name. Today the name isn’t the thing, after all just what did Google mean fourteen years ago? Of course we know now, years on, that it means to Google something, but before the Google name was invented the poor word meant nothing at all.

And then there’s Zoopla, who don’t have anything to do with caged animals either, they sell houses (I think) even if they do sound like a fairground attraction or something a stage magician might say.

Even Flybe, an airline I believe, leaves me with a big question mark above my head. Perhaps it’s the ‘be’ bit I don’t get, anyway Shakespeare would have loved it; he invented over 1700 new words in his plays and poetry… “Flybe or not Flybe, that is the question?” (sorry)

Of course I know that it’s all about brand, but I still long for the days when businesses had names that meant something, anything, and weren’t simply invented words. Mind you, given that just about every word in the Oxford English is now owned by somebody as a domain name it’s hardly surprising that the marketing men are having to scratch there well-groomed bonces to invent new ones. Maybe they are looking at the index pages of old telephone directories; there’s probably a lot of potential zany names there.

Oh for the days of British Gas and Rail and Steel and Coal and Telecom and Kodak. No, not Kodak. Kodak didn’t mean anything until it became a camera. It seems that the days of the company name that meant something are dead, as dead as Kodak and good old Yellow Pages.