Search for content of interest

  • About
  • ServiceS
    • Branding
    • Innovation
    • Naming
    • Strategy
    • Research
    • Design
  • Work
  • Insights
  • News
  • LOCATIONS
    • Shanghai
    • Paris
    • New York
    • Singapore
    • Malaysia

CN FR
  • About
  • ServiceS
    • Branding
    • Innovation
    • Naming
    • Strategy
    • Research
    • Design
  • Work
  • Insights
  • News
  • LOCATIONS
    • Shanghai
    • Paris
    • New York
    • Singapore
    • Malaysia
CONTACT

EN

  • CN
  • FR

Home Insights Our Thinking Detail

EXPERTISE

  • Naming
Contact Us

Chinese Brand Alphabetic Naming: How to Craft Strong Alphabetic Names for Chinese Brands?

In recent years, Chinese brands have stepped abroad with an increasingly confident attitude. In the meantime, Chinese brands targeting local consumers are also going through subtle changes in positioning as well. These changes can be reflected in Chinese brand alphabetic naming. From Haier, HUAWEI to Bilibili, ByteDance, there is clearly an evolution in the alphabetic name style of Chinese brands.

How should a Chinese brand create a good alphabetic name?  What is the relationship between the brands’ alphabetic and Chinese names? Let’s check it out.

CHINESE BRAND ALPHABETIC NAMING TECHNIQUE & STYLE

Overall, Chinese brands’ alphabetic names nowadays tend to be more distinctive, dynamic, or impactful than ever before; the naming approach is also more diversified:

Daily Expression Name:
Brand name using daily language (including greetings) makes it easier to resonate with the audience and conveys an easy-going brand attitude. For example:

HEYTEA (new tea beverage), Sober Hi (beverage station), Hellobike (bicycle-sharing), HUGGAH (oral care), etc. HUGGAH uses onomatopoeia which is extremely colloquial; even there are two hidden mouths in its Chinese name 呼嘎 ([hū gā] exhale/quack), clearly pointing out the brand’s major business offering of oral care.

Brand names using daily language
Brand names using daily language

Rhythmic Name:
Clap your hands, stomp your feet, and let’s swing together! In addition to our dance leader ByteDance and beat master Tik Tok, let’s take a look at the other active members in the beat group:

The smart use of repetitive words makes the name unique and cute. BOBORE (personal care) and LELECHA (new tea beverage) use repetitive syllables to bring a lively and vibrant feel. PatPat pictures a mother patting a baby, revealing the brand’s maternal & infant categories. Other similar cases are tap4fun (one of the first Chinese mobile game companies to go overseas), dido (wearable smart device), and Wholly Moly! (new health food), etc.

Brands use the rhythmic name
Brands use the rhythmic name

The showcased names all apply repeated syllables or a combination of short pronunciations to make the names read rhythmic. Such names are extremely readable and can easily stick in your mind.

In fact, Chinese characters are ideographic originally that use shapes to express meaning. While in English and Latin languages, people can understand the meaning of words by only listening. Pronunciation is undoubtedly important for alphabetic names. A rhythmic name carries a great advantage to leave a deep impression in consumers’ minds.

Visualization:
Let’s step from concert to the cinema, and discover how Chinese brand alphabetic naming uses visual expressions to communicate with the audience:

  • OFO (used to be a famous bicycle-sharing brand) is formed with 3 letters that look exactly like the shape of a bicycle. A very smart way to build a consistent brand identity across verbal and visual.
  • OPPO (telecom) looks very smooth with the roundness, together with the symmetry, this name appears very harmonious.
  • VIVO (telecom) combines both a sharp point (V) and a circle shape, indicating innovative technology and the beauty of the design. IQOO, 4 letters containing I and O, well inherited the blood of VIVO; “OO” visually also implies the brand’s positioning towards millennials (also called post 00 in Chinese).
Brand names use visual expressions
Brand names use visual expressions

Unique concept names:
Twists or gags in novels and other artworks often make people confused in the beginning. Once they got the intention behind it, they would shout out loud to it. Unexpected and unconventional concepts cases are not rare at all in alphabetic names of Chinese brands:

  • The stylized makeup brand Girlcult indicates the brand characteristic of “non-mainstream beauty.
  • Algebraist (coffee): What? Those who fail algebra can’t make good coffee? You get it: In Algebraist, the ratio of every ingredient is extremely precise to ensure accurate taste control of each cup of coffee.
  • %Arabica (coffee) gives you the promise of “100% adoption of Arabica beans”;
  • Another symbolic one: Bluedash (wine) shows the unlimited possibilities of product collocation through the space created with the dash.
  • Starfield, opens up the future “star” field of plant meat.
  • Particle Fever (high-end sports), with the collision between technology and passion, what kind of sparks will there be?
Chinese Brand Alphabetic Naming
Unique concept brand names

The names above jump out of conventional logic in terms of word expression and concept combination. Such eye-catching and interesting alphabetic names are especially numerous among FMCG, fast fashion, local trendy stores, and Gen-Z brands. In fact, the language habits and characteristics of each individual are the integration of multilingualism and multi-information cognition. In the Age of the Internet, this phenomenon is sharply amplified, and it is the wave top of the language evolution torrent.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ALPHABETIC AND CHINESE NAMES

The relationship between Chinese and Alphabetic names is nothing more than the connection of pronunciation/meaning, as can be seen in the table below.

Chinese Brand Alphabetic Naming: Relationship
Relationship between Chinese and Alphabetic names

It is not difficult to perceive that purely transliterated names like Galanz, Meters/Bonwe are no longer common in today’s Chinese brands. Once, the biggest feature of this type of name was that it helped to shape a unified international brand image (Western style used to mean high-end, fashionable, and worthy of following to almost all Chinese). In the past two decades, with too many local brands’ imitations, this method has long been considered unoriginal and gradually faded out of people’s sight.

On the other hand, “literal translation” or “transliteration + meaning” approaches are more widely used in brand bilingual naming today. The name style tends to be symbolic and unconstraint such as IM 智己 (electric car, [zhì jǐ] intelligent/self); Little Touch 哩头([lǐ tóu] auxiliary word/head). Even the names using “transliteration” are visibly different from pure transliteration in the traditional sense, such as SHEIN 希音 (fast fashion, [xī yīn] hope/sound). This is inseparable from factors such as people’s lifestyle, language habits, and the development of Internet language, etc., and belongs to the cultural projection of the current era in which we live.

Chinese pinyin has been put into use since the 1950s. From Haier 海尔, HUAWEI 华为 to TouTiao 今日头条, Pidan, LELECHA 乐乐茶, pinyin is still used by some Chinese brands as alphabetic names, but the proportion has slightly decreased in recent years. Today, many names in pinyin form tend to be more international and are more aligned with the pronunciation habits of foreign languages.

CONCLUSION

Does a Chinese brand need an alphabetic name and how to create a good one? Here we summarize some key factors to help answer this question:

  • For brands targeting overseas markets, a concise and catchy alphabetic name that conforms to the pronunciation habits of foreign languages will definitely increase the brand’s communication power on the global stage.
  • For brands targeting the Chinese market, a unique and interesting alphabetic name will help open up dialogues with certain target audiences such as Gen-Z. It is important that the alphabetic name reflects well the brand image and value and is consistent with the Chinese name.
  • In addition, due to the increasingly crowded trademark environment in China, it is extremely challenging to have a Chinese brand name that is easy to remember and can pass the trademark registration examination. Alphabetic names are relatively easy to pass the trademark registration. This might be the fundamental reason why some local brands only have alphabetic names or have it first, and then follow up to launch their Chinese names.

We have seen the great evolution of Chinese brand alphabetic naming. In the next decade, what new changes can happen? Let’s witness together.

  • SHARE
  • 
  • 
  • 
  • 
BACK

Sign up for our newsletter to get the latest insights, tips, and trends in branding, naming and innovation.

Related Article




Branding Strategies: Branding Through the Olympics for Chinese and Global Brands

As the world anticipates the 2012 Summer Olympic Games in London, brands gear up for a unique opportunity to enhance their visibility and explore new marketing avenues. T…

Color Wars: Multi-Branded Strategy in French Telecommunications

Multi-branded strategy in French telecommunications echoes the industry trends observed in automotive. As the automotive sector engages in discussions around geographic o…

Verbal Branding: How to Crack into Gen-Z’s World?

Gen-Z (people born between 1996~2010), is found to have more diversified needs, higher consumption potential and stronger national self-esteem. They have gradually become…

MADReport: Product & Service Localization for Web Companies

Dear Reader,It is with great excitement that the MADJOR team brings you the second MADReport of 2017. Published quarterly, MADReports bring forward the best of the team’s…

What We Can Learn on Semiotics in Market Research from Being in a Room Full of Semioticians: Takeaways from Semiofest 2017

July 21, 2017, marked the 106th birthday of media theorist Marshall McLuhan who once said: “The medium is the message”. It also happened to mark the annual Semiofest host…

Post-Crisis Brand Strategy: How Should Brands Evolve in Times of A Global Health Crisis?

Navigating Uncertainty: Crafting a Post-Crisis Brand Strategy amid the Ongoing COVID-19 Pandemic As the global effort to contain COVID-19 unfolds, uncertainty about our c…

Brand Strategy: Buy the Brand, Buy the Market?

Decoding Brand Strategy: Unveiling the Impact of Market Imitation In our latest post, 'Steal the Brand, Steal the Market,' we delve into the strategic use of brand names …

Blockchain Your Brand Promise: How to Leverage the Blockchain as a Brand Manager

There is no shortage of research on the Blockchain and its implications for disrupting current technologies. Indeed, while the Blockchain started with grassroots projects…

Ready to take your brand to new heights?

Let's start a conversation.
  • NEWSLETTER
  • CAREERS
  • PRIVACY POLICY
  • Labbrand Group
  • Labbrand
  • Madjor
  • SpringPillar

* Will be used in accordance with our Privacy Policy

A Labbrand Group Company © 2005-2025 Labbrand All rights reserved

沪ICP备17001253号-3
  • Follow us:
  • 
  • 
  • 
  • 
  • 
  • 

Contact us to get the latest insights, tips, and trends in branding, naming, and innovation.

* Will be used in accordance with our Privacy Policy

Cookie Notice

To improve your experience, we use cookies to provide social media features, offer you content that targets your particular interests, and analyse the performance of our advertising campaigns. By clicking on “Accept” you consent to all cookies. You also have the option to click “Reject” to limit the use of certain types of cookies. Please be aware that rejecting cookies may affect your website browsing experience and limit the use of some personalised features.

Accept Reject