A Creative ViZen line would sell like crazy

Question

Some constructi've critisism.
Creative's archille's heel is that they always come up with crappy names for their mp3 products.
Why does Creative always come up with names for their products that are hard to remember and easily confused with other products that they have?
Why can't they just come up with a name that is short and sweet, distinct and easy to remember?The longer the name, the easier it is to forget.
That's a big reason that the iPod is so huge. The name is so easy to remember and its catchy. There is a certain flow to the term "apple ipod" and it sticks in people's heads. It makes marketing very easy.
Zen Vision:M ? come on... that's so easily confused with their Zen Vision.. uh is there a Zen Vision Sleek too? I forget... it's hard to keep track.
ANYWAY its so obvious...
"Zen" *is* a great base for a name. "Vision" makes sense too because of what the product does.
But Creative Zen Vision? Yeah its a logical name but it has absolutely *no* ring to it. No flow. It's hard to remember. it makes marketing pretty difficult if people can't remember what the product is called.
Creative Zen Vision:M is even worse. That's an even bigger mouthful. And what does the M stand for anyway? It's not memorable.
What's easier to say? What's easier to remember? "Apple iPod" or "Creative Zen Vision:M"?
So... instead of Creative Zen Vision:M..
Why not call it simply.. Creative ViZen?
Sounds like... Creative Vision.. that would be pretty catchy I think... Creative ViZen.
Something easy for ppl to remember. After all, "creative vision" is a common phrase that everybody has heard hundreds of times. By putting the "Zen" name in it.. i think that would sell alot better than a mouthful / hard to remember name. Why didn't anyone at Creative think of it's It's so obvious :P
And models can be differentiated with a number to signify gigabytes so this first one can be called the...Creative ViZen:30
If the next one is 60 gigabytes then obviously it would be called the.. Creative ViZen:60
People would know the capacity of the product without having to read the fine print! Now wouldn't that be amazing?
Anyway, their naming strategy needs work.
A possible conversation:
"hey what do u have there?""a Creative Zen Vision:M""uh.. creative zen.. whats that?""its like an iPod but better""oh its a knock off"
this would sound better:
"hey what do u have there?""a Creative ViZen""oh i've heard of those.. can i see?"
Just my 2 cents
Creative ViZen vs. Apple iPod
that sounds like a winnable marketing fight.and hey.. what the heck does "ipod" mean anyway?!?

Answer 1

Creative ViZen is more descripti've, catchy and easily attached to the name Creative.
If you're just some person in the street and hear the word "zen", you think of some buddist meditation thing.
If you hear the word "vizen", you make a connection to the word "vision" and Creative has made a big step towards brand recognition because it plays on the phrase "creative vision" that *everybody* has heard hundreds and even thousands of times.
ViZen would be "their own" word.
iPod is Apple's word.
Get it's
Zen aint their word. It's been around for centuries and the word Vision has been around even longer.
The number of words is less important than the number of syllables.
apple ipod = 3
creative vizen = 4
Creative Zen Vision:M is 7 syllables for crying out loud and it doesn't even tell the casual person on the street what it is. It's clunky and cumbersome. No flow.
Its also confusing giving 2 products the same name. There is the portable media player and this mp3 player. They just put a :M at the end which means nothing to Joe Blow. What the...
I am actually more informed that the average person. Ever been to their store/buying page? zen touch zen sleek zen nano zen touch zen etc... and they all look the same. I was confused and I can imagine Joe Blow going to the online store and seeing all this zen stuff, getting all confused and saying "to heck with it, i'll just get an ipod, at least i'll know what i'm getting" Why confuse the customer? Not good.
Even though Zen Micro is a good name, it doesn't say anything... apart from being a small "zen"
Creative is seen as a follower but that shouldn't be the case.
I remember when all they had were sound cards and the nomad, or nomad jukebox and that was years before the iPod. I was lookin for drivers for my sound card and i see a "nomad" thing mentioned. I didn't know what it was until i looked at the product page then forgot about it.
Even then, they just called everything nomad, which is an odd word and it starts with the word "no"
Not a good selling point either.
Creative sure knows how to shoot themselves in the foot when it comes to naming their mp3 products :P
I heard something about marketing once and it was this. You can have the best product the world has ever seen but if you don't have a marketing strategy, you have nothing.
Just look at AMD. They are where they are because they had a plan since 999 when they came out with the Athlon cpu. "Athlon" didn't mean anything but that was ok because it was short, sweet and it was *their* word. Now "Athlon" means something and when you hear that word, you think of AMD.
The main thing is that they gave more bang for the buck vs Intel's cpus. But they also had a strategy when it came to mass appeal and came up with a good, short, distincti've name that is *theirs* I have always been a big AMD fan and was one of the first on their bandwagon. I had bought the brand new, top of the line cutting edge Athlon XP 800+... woohooo! (upgrading now to an Opteron 65 )
See what AMD does? They *invent* nice words. Athlon, Opteron, Sempron.
With the Zen Vision:M, Creative is giving more bang for the buck than Apple, but "Zen" and "Vision" are ordinary words that will never be glued to Creative the way that Athlon is glued to AMD or the way iPod is glued to Apple.
I always root for the underdog that deli'vers more bang for the buck. Which is why I chose AMD over Intel and which is why I would like to see Creative not shoot themselves in the foot with these brutal names.
I have never owned an mp3 player before but when I do, it will be a Creative mp3 player. *NO* way will I buy an iPod. I was actually considering the Zen Micro Photo but this product is very good too and eventually will probably end up getting a Creative Zen Vision:M... "whatever that is" LOL