The new name is Microsoft Dynamics. The word “solutions” as been ineffectual white noise for some time now, and the word “business” brings very little to the table, so congratulations to Microsoft for finding a solutions solution. Accountingsoftware.com and PressPass bring us some details:

PressPass: Why is Microsoft Dynamics a good name for “Project Green” and Microsoft Business Solutions?

Reller [Tami Reller, corporate vice president of Microsoft’s Business Solutions Group]: We undertook and completed a significant research project that was amongst the most extensive naming research projects Microsoft has ever done. We conducted hundreds of interviews with business decision makers and IT decision makers in the U.S. and international markets. These interviews yielded a number of findings, including that our customers and partners strongly prefer a brand that is suggestive rather than merely descriptive or fanciful.

At least they spent a ton of money making sure of the obvious. And now, armed with a pricey PP presentation and reams of focus grope data, they boldly embrace the obvious. Their conclusion is correct however. Neither descriptive nor fanciful names are acceptable choices, and by “fanciful” we assume they mean “random”. With good intentions and a little knowledge, Microsoft pushes the name changes further, truncating the fanciful:

• Microsoft CRM becomes Microsoft Dynamics CRM.
• Microsoft Business Solutions-Great Plains becomes Microsoft Dynamics GP.
• Microsoft Business Solutions-Axapta® becomes Microsoft Dynamics AX.
• Microsoft Business Solutions-Navision becomes Microsoft Dynamics NAV.
• Microsoft Business Solutions-Solomon becomes Microsoft Dynamics SL.

The idea is right, Great Plains, Axapta and Navision are all worthless, random names (fanciful), with Solomon going to the relative head of the class on a bulbous curve. Those names rightly deserve the ax. But what is the point of replacing them with the equally ineffectual abbreviations GP, AV, NAV and SL, respectively? It is unimaginable, even for Microsoft, to believe these letter combos will summon the old ineffectual names in anyone’s mind, and even if they did, why call back to the bad “fanciful” names at all, given all the “research” and such?

Because this idea is so inane, and as much as it pains us, we have to give Microsoft the benefit of the out. We’re betting these initials are transitory, part of a strategy to phase these names out. It would be a solid strategy, as dropping them at the same time as renaming Business Solutions would be a confusing, brand equity hemorrhage. Looks like they understand the need for a transitional period, and if so, the entire effort is very well done.

Any bets?

There is no shortage of what the…? names adorning women’s brands. Sag Harbor, as the name of a women’s clothing brand aimed at women over 35 is one of the standard bearers. But the honoree for this year’s huevos grande award was never in doubt. It goes to upscale handbag brand name Lauren Merkin. Extra points for taking a low riding word like merkin and passing it right under our noses, lightly perfumed by the preceding “Lauren”.

Seriously though, how is it that these pricey purses, which everyone refers to as “a Merkin”, can keep their cachet given the negative meaning of the word? It’s because consumers are never, ever literalists. The “negative” meaning just gives people something to remember, to talk about, to have a laugh about. It never stands in the way of sales and is great word of mouth. The “negative” is really a positive.

If more companies were focused on keeping the cash register ringing, rather than on silly personal thoughts like “ I don’t want to be on the board of Merkin, let’s not name it that”, we’d have a far bigger pool of cost effective names out there.

More on the naming principal of of negativity can be read here.

Says Blandor the Imponderable: “That name puts the cod back in my codpiece. Jouissance! I’ve been sporting this merkin on my dome for years, perhaps now the cruel taunting will be at an end. The most uniquely unique name to ooze through the pipe since this prickly chestnut was passed.

[ More posts about naming products | More posts about naming companies ]

A couple of Saturdays ago, the NY Times ran this story:

MILL VALLEY, Calif. – Tommy Odom’s remains lie on a steep wind-swept hill at Forever Fernwood, beneath an oak sapling, a piece of petrified wood and a bundle of dried sage tied with a lavender ribbon. When he died in a traffic accident last year, Mr. Odom, 41, became the first of 40 people at Fernwood cemetery to move on to greener pastures – literally. He was buried un-embalmed in a biodegradable pine coffin painted with daisies and rainbows, his soul marked by prairie grasses instead of a granite colossus.

Here, where redwood forests and quivering wildflower meadows replace fountains and manicured lawns, graves are not merely graves. They are ecosystems in which “each person is replanted, becoming a little seed bank,” said Tyler Cassity, a 35-year-old entrepreneur who reopened the long-moldering cemetery last fall.

Finally, a chance for you to do at least one good thing before you die, almost. And most convenient for this blogger, as Forever Ferwood sits atop a hill not 300 yards from my new home. This development does, however, put a stall in my plans to have a well dug in the backyard.

The name “Forever Fernwood” is compelling, and prods us to dig into the forensic etymology of the name of pop culture blip “Fernwood 2-Night”, a television show which starred Martin Mull way back in 1978. Mr. Mull spent a good amount of time in Mill Valley and its surrounding county of Marin, in fact he starred in the film “Serial”, an adaptation of the book “The Serial: A Year in the Life of Marin County” As described by Wikipedia:

The Serial is divided into 52 short chapters and it chronicles the lives, loves, and relationships of a number of residents, mostly in their mid-to-late 30s and their 40s, of Marin County, a suburban, generally very affluent county directly across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco. The plot revolves around Harvey and Kate Holroyd, a couple in the midst of the mid-1970s Marin lifestyle who are undergoing marital problems, although there are many other characters introduced and described throughout the novel.

There are elements of soap opera in the book, although the tone is comedic (specifically, satirical) rather than tragic. The novel describes its characters’ lifestyles, including their interest in various New Age beliefs and human potential movement groups (including est, transcendental meditation, consciousness-raising, and rebirthing); their unconventional and arguably lax child-rearing techniques; and their embrace of a number of then-current fads, such as fern bars, jogging, and organic food. The book satirizes many of the elements of a particular mid-to-late 1970s subculture, also described to some degree by author Tom Wolfe in his 1976 non-fiction essay “The Me Decade and the Third Great Awakening”, particularly as manifested in the lives of people then between the ages of about 30 and 45 in affluent parts of California.

Many of the characters in The Serial also speak using a particular jargon or lexicon, saying words and phrases like “flash on” (a phrasal verb meaning to “have a sudden insight about”), “Really” (to signify assent), and others.

The Serial contains a great number of specific references to actual locations (restaurants, stores, streets) in 1970s Marin County. In the original edition of the book, and in most if not all later editions, black-and-white illustrations of scenes from the novel accompany the text in many of the chapters.

So was Fernwood 2-Night named after the cemetery Forever Fernwood? You might think it too big a stretch, until deeper digging reveals this bone chip about t.v. show “Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman”:

…a few of the supporting cast who appeared in the series
included Martin Mull, Orson Bean, Dabney Coleman, Shelley
Berman, Shelley Fabares, Richard Hatch and Tab Hunter;
the series was first run as a syndicated series, and then
was picked up for late-night broadcast on the “CBS Late Movie”
when they ran out of movies; after Louise Lasser left the
series, the title was changed to reflect the name of the
fictional town…

aka: “Forever Fernwood”

Later, after “Forever Fernwood” ran out of steam, producer
Norman Lear extended the franchise even further by creating
creating a fictional local talk show as fodder for even more
satire, called “Fernwood 2-Night”

So there you have it. And no, we don’t have anything better to do.