Online, you can find sites set up for web-based naming competitions. Although this may seem like a fast, inexpensive and effective way to come up with a new company name or product name, the process has nine serious pitfalls. Learn more about naming, or find a professional naming company to hire, at www.namedatlast.com. Copyright 2013 Marcia Yudkin.

1. Crowdsourcing:
9 Hidden Pitfalls
Looking for a new business
name?
Crowdsourcing may seem like
a cheap, fast way to tap the
wisdom of crowds. However…
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2. Crowdsourcing:
9 Hidden Pitfalls
Pitfall #1
No confidentiality.
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3. Soliciting suggestions makes your plans and
the competitive advantages of your company
or product public.
If you try to be cagey and provide less
information for this reason, the ideas you
receive are less relevant.
This is the deadliest downfall of
crowdsourcing.
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4. Crowdsourcing:
9 Hidden Pitfalls
Pitfall #2
Poor quality entries.
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5. Crowdsourcing contestants submit whatever
comes to them off the top of their heads.
They may not know much about your industry
and don't take the time to learn about it.
They often ignore your stated naming criteria,
so you must wade through a ton of wildly off-
target suggestions.
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6. Crowdsourcing:
9 Hidden Pitfalls
Pitfall #3
Wrong direction.
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7. Because amateur namers don't look at the
whole business landscape, they can lead you in
a very foolish direction.
This pitfall ensnared Kraft Foods Australia in a
PR nightmare when they selected the product
name "iSnack 2.0" from a crowdsourcing
competition, then retracted the name after
massive public outcry.
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8. Crowdsourcing:
9 Hidden Pitfalls
Pitfall #4
Popularity misleads.
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9. The number of votes an idea receives has
nothing to do with whether the target audience
will find it appealing, whether a name is legally
free for use, whether it contains connotations
that might backfire on the company, whether it
is sufficiently distinct from the competition,
etc.
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10. Crowdsourcing:
9 Hidden Pitfalls
Pitfall #5
Stolen or recycled names.
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11. Sad but true: Contestants in crowdsourcing
competitions frequently submit ideas they
have copied, plagiarized or submitted in other
competitions.
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12. Crowdsourcing:
9 Hidden Pitfalls
Pitfall #6
Coming up empty.
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13. When you eliminate all the crowdsourced
entries that are not legally available,
linguistically wise and appropriate from a
marketing standpoint, you may have nothing
left.
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14. Crowdsourcing:
9 Hidden Pitfalls
Pitfall #7
Derailment.
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15. When NASA asked the public to help name a
new room to be added to future American
space stations, comedian Stephen Colbert
asked his fans to suggest it be called "Colbert."
And indeed they did, in droves, so that he
received 40,000 more votes than the runner-
up name. The U.S. space agency was not
amused.
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16. Crowdsourcing:
9 Hidden Pitfalls
Pitfall #8
Missing the best talent.
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17. Those with great experience and skills do not
frequent crowdsourcing sites.
Yet experts are much more likely than eager
amateurs and novices to nail the assignment.
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18. Crowdsourcing:
9 Hidden Pitfalls
Pitfall #9
Hidden costs.
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19. Culling through thousands of submissions
takes time and personnel.
Because of the high probability of copyright
infringement, legal expenses mount up, also.
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20. Crowdsourcing:
9 Hidden Pitfalls
Commentary by
Marcia Yudkin,
Founder of the Naming Company
Named At Last
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