I'm the founder and president of Lexicon Branding.

我是 Lexicon Branding 公司的創辦人。

We want to create names that are noteworthy.

我們想要創造引人注目的名字。

Something that makes people think there may be something different here, something better for me.

是讓人們覺得與眾不同，且對我來說是更好的東西。

Lexicon has named almost 4,000 brands in 19 countries.

Lexicon 已經在 19 個國家中命名 4,000 個品牌。

Like BlackBerry, Dibs, and all of these.

像是 BlackBerry、Dibs、還有這些。

They charge somewhere between 40 and 250 thousand dollars.

他們的收費在 4 到 25 萬美元之間。

And David says it's worth the price.

David 認為這是值得的。

He's been naming things for over 30 years.

他已經從事命名工作超過 30 年了。

And it's not as simple as you might think.

這不像你想的那麼容易。

There's a lot of work that goes into it, and it's as much a science as it is an art.

這需要很多工作準備才能完成，它既像是一門科學，也像一門藝術。

One of the things that we've invested quite a lot of money in is this area of sound,

我們投入大量資金在其中一件事就是聲音的領域。

technically called sound symbolism in the world of linguistics.

在語言學領域中，技術上稱為聲音象徵。

Lexicon spent two million dollars and five years studying the sounds of letters and the associations we have with those sounds.

Lexicon 花了 2 百萬美元和 5 年的時間，研究字母的發音和我們與聲音的連結。

We went to Poland, France, Japan.

我們去了波蘭、法國、日本。

And what we found was that some things are very universal.

然後我們發現有些東西是全球通用的。

For example, the sound of "V."

例如：V 的發音。

Whether you're born in Paris or you were born in the Bronx, "V" is about aliveness and vitality.

不論你出生在巴黎或是布朗克斯，V 都是生命力和活力的象徵。

That's one of the reasons they named this car Venza.

這就是其中一個他們將車命名為 Venza 的原因。

We also were able to identify names that communicated or supported more reliability than others.

我們還可以認出比其他字母更能傳遞涵義或是更值得依賴的名字。

So the sound of "B" and "T," highly reliable.

所以 B 和 T 的聲音非常可靠。

Hence, BlackBerry.

因此出現 BlackBerry。

BlackBerry also stands out because it's not literal.

因為 BlackBerry 不只是字面上的意思，因此與眾不同。

David says a bad name is one that's too descriptive.

David 說過度詮釋並不是好名字。

You know, there's always this temptation to use logic to explain something.

你懂得，總是需要用邏輯來解釋才會引人注目。

But what fires the imagination and the human mind is not logic.

但是激發想像力和人們思維的並不是邏輯。

A perfect example of this, David says, is Swiffer, one of Lexicon's biggest naming successes.

David 說 Swiffer 是一個典型的例子，而這個名字也是 Lexicon 公司最成功的命名。

One of the things that they had tried to trademark, and fortunately, I think, for them and for us, it wasn't available, was ProMop and EasyMop.

其中他們嘗試用商標，慶幸的是對他們和我來說，ProMop 和 EasyMop 是不能使用的名字。

Their perspective was that they had improved the mop.

他們的特色就是他們改善了拖把。

We were quick to point out to them that this doesn't really look like a mop.

我們很快地指出這點，這真的不像是拖把。

David and his team surveyed 30 people about cleaning.

David 和他的團隊調查了 30 個人的清潔工作。

No one liked to mop.

沒有人喜歡拖地。

Our creative insight and strategy was, let's put some joy in the world of mopping and cleaning.

我們創意的想法和策略就是讓拖地和打掃的工作變得有趣。

We have that action of sweeping.

我們有清潔的動作。

We have the -er of the verbal ending, but there's no such thing as Swiffer.

我們有語言結尾 -er，但卻沒有像 Swiffer 這樣的東西。

At the same time, a competitive company came out with ReadyMop.

同時，有一家競爭公司推出 ReadyMop。

But it didn't do anything, it didn't get my attention, it wasn't noteworthy.

但是卻沒有任何作用，也不吸引我注意，根本就不引人注目。

And today as we sit here in this interview, Swiffer is somewhere around a six billion dollar brand sold in 15 countries.

然後今天當我們坐在這裡被採訪時，Swiffer 這個品牌已經在 15 個國家銷售了約 60 億美元。

But David says naming things today is a lot harder than when he first started.

但是 David 說現今命名比以前他剛開始起步時還要困難。

For one, there are just way fewer names to choose from.

其中一個原因是可供選擇的名字更少了。

In 2004, there were 1.2 million active trademarks in the US.

在 2004 年，美國有 120 萬個商標。

Now, there are two million.

現在已經有 200 萬個。

There were almost 640,000 applications filed last year alone.

僅去年一年就有 64 萬件商標申請。

And because of the internet, any product that comes out now is essentially global.

由於網路的發達，任何東西基本上都是全球性的商品。

That means you have to work harder to stand out.

這代表你必須更加努力地脫穎而出。

And you have to be sure your name works in more than one language and culture.

你必須保證你取的名字適用於多個語言和文化。

And so if your name in Portuguese or French means something negative or untoward, you're gonna hear about it.

如果你的名字在葡萄牙語或是法語意味不好或不利的意思，你會知道。

So, it's worth getting it right.

因此值得取對名字。

When you think about it, nothing will be used more often or for longer than a company or a product's brand name.

當你思考時，你會發現沒有任何東西比公司品牌名字用得更久。

So what we do becomes vitally important. That makes it interesting to me.

所以這就是為什麼我們做的事情很重要，而且對我來說很有趣。