A name in any other language just might cause problems

And the whoops of the day goes to the German company TrekStor, who tripped into a multicultural morass with the name of their latest MP3 player - the i.beat.blaxx. (They quickly renamed the product to simply blaxx.) Thing is, the multicultural aspects of a name are just one or many vital considerations during a naming exercise, a process that a Ford executive recently called "one of the most arduous and crappy tasks that an organization ever has to do."

As if naming isn't difficult enough already, here are but a few of the questions we ask ourselves when creating new names. Does the name advance the vital attributes of the brand? Is it memorable? Will it cause an uncomfortable acronym? How differentiable is it from the competition? Is it even available, or is it already trademarked?

When you imagine the vast amount of input surrounding these questions, it's no wonder Buick unveiled a car in Canada called the LaCrosse - teenage French Canadian slang for masturbation. Or Perdue Farm's famous slogan, "It takes a tough man to make a tender chicken," has an entirely unappealing meaning in Spanish: "It takes a sexually aroused man to make a chicken affectionate."

The lesson of today's blog is namers beware. Getting lost in translation isn't good for business.