The sticky factor
What makes certain things stick and others not?
Chip and Dan Heath, authors of Made to Stick, consider what makes an idea sticky, and conclude that it’s all about SUCCESs:
- Simplicity: stripping the ideas to their core
- Unexpectedness: sticky ideas involve mystery and encourage exploration
- Credible ideas are more likely to stick
- Concreteness helps to break down abstract ideas into smaller concrete units
- Emotions are the bridge to connectivity: sticky ideas are good at connecting to what people care about
- Stories give ideas a personality
Brand names aren’t much different: the good ones inspire us and stand out from the crowd. The best brand names use simple ideas and develop them into personalities. But where exactly is the sticky factor?
Often the key to stickiness is in bringing new ideas across by connecting them to already known or established concepts.
When you hear Nike, what is the first thing that comes to your mind: the Greek goddess of victory or the sports brand? Windows: what you open when it’s warm out or a computer operating system? In most cases it is the latter, which goes to show that sticky ideas can take over and replace old ones.
Brands like Amazon, Twitter, and Oracle created their names by starting with something we already knew and turning it into something new. They managed to tell a story with just one word.
Good brand names rise beyond mere descriptions. They stick with us, they inspire, encourage, and entertain. We use them to name products (Kleenex), we turn them into verbs (Facebook), and express our identities through their slogans.
Which brands do you remember the most and what comes to mind? Get googling and tell us!
