Brief Buck
Start a campaign
✦ Task type · Research and checks

Name testing, in the languages you will actually launch in

A name only has to be wrong in one market to be wrong. The cases that become famous were all approved by people who spoke one language.

Post this taskThinking of taking one instead?

Name testing is cheap, fast, and skipped almost every time, usually because the team has already fallen for the name. The value is entirely in doing it before the decision rather than after.

What to put in the public brief

Keep the candidate names private. They are the most confidential thing you have at this stage.

What to put in the private instructions

  1. Ask them to say it aloud before reading anything else

    Then write down how they pronounced it, phonetically or in their own words. Divergent pronunciations are the most common finding and the easiest to miss.

  2. Ask what it sounds like it means

    Before you tell them what the product is. Afterwards the answer is contaminated and they will find a way to make it fit.

  3. Ask what it resembles

    Existing brands, common words, slang, anything close. This is where the expensive discoveries happen.

  4. Ask whether it is awkward to say

    To a colleague, out loud, in a meeting. A name that people avoid saying is a name that does not spread.

Proof worth requiring

Ask for

Written answers per name, their first language, and the country they live in now. Both matter: a speaker who has lived abroad for a decade reads differently from one who has not.

Do not ask for

A favourite. You are not running an election, and the ranking will encourage you to treat a preference as a verdict when the useful output is the list of problems.

When this task type is the wrong tool

If the name is already trademarked, printed and live, this produces anxiety rather than options. Do it before, or not at all.

If what you are testing is a tagline or positioning rather than a name, concept feedback is the better instrument because it asks about meaning rather than sound.

Common questions

How many markets should I cover?

Every market you plan to sell in, plus any language widely spoken in them. This is one of the few research tasks where coverage matters more than sample size: five people in each of six markets is far more useful than sixty in one.

What should I actually ask?

How they would say it out loud, what it sounds like it means, whether it resembles any existing word or brand, and whether anything about it would be awkward to say to a colleague. The last question catches more than the other three combined.

Does this replace a trademark search?

No, and the two are not substitutes. A trademark search is a legal check against registers; this is a linguistic and cultural check against people. Run both, and run this one first because it is cheaper to discard a name before the legal spend.

What reward is fair?

Five to twelve dollars for a short considered response. Raise it for markets with few registered workers, since coverage rather than volume is what you are buying.

Thinking of taking this task?

The same job, from the other side. Rewards are set by the poster, so treat these as the range this task type usually sits in rather than a promise.

Usually pays
$5 to $12
You need
First-language fluency in the market
Proof expected
Written answers per name, with your first language and country

Say each name aloud and write down how you said it before reading anything else. Your unprompted pronunciation is the data.

Create a worker account

Test a name

Set the reward and the markets you need covered. Workers in those places reserve a spot; the candidate names stay private until they do.

Post this task