The "Rules" of Naming Your Company or Organization

A good name is short, no more than 11 characters and 3 syllables. Imagine trying to put something like "St. Albans Neighborhood Watch" on a bumper sticker or a T-shirt. 

Monosyllabic brand names are often proper names like Bose or Hanes but it's nearly impossible to obey the rules below in one syllable. For me, the holy grail of great branding is to do it in two syllables and no more than 6 characters. Try it. It's hard. AirBus is great. Nike is named for the winged mythological Greek goddess of victory. Get it? The "swoosh" comes from the wings. Nike puts wings on a lot of feet. Pixar, PayPal and Pampers are pretty good 2-syllable brand names. 

St. Albans Neighborhood Watch is unimaginative and the term "neighborhood watch" is fraught with baggage. You pretty much don't want a brand with the same name as a bad comedy movie starring Ben Stiller and Vince Vaughn. 

A good name is information dense or contains a hint of what theorganization is about.  Vizio. Papermate. 

Sony comes from a Latin word that means "sound." Much better than its original name, Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo.

Drug companies are really good at it. Levitra hints at levitation. Healthcare companies often have "care" or "health" somewhere in their name to hint at what they do. Caremark. Cardinal Health.

A good name doesn't tempt people to turn it into an abbreviation ormonogram. Yeah, I know, IBM and BMW survived it but most companies
just become more obscure when people distill their too-long name to a
monogram. IBM and BMW got away with becoming alpahabet soup because these companies were created at a time when we didn't know any better than to name companies "International Business Machines" and "Bavarian Motor Works" and because these old companies spent billions to become household words. Startups and companies with small ad budgets have no margin for error; they have to choose a name that cuts through the clutter and the cacophony of ideas and messages and brands vying for our attention.

A good name is unique and memorable. Toys R Us. Dunkin' Donuts. The latter has the advantage of appealing to your senses by conjuring a pleasant mental picture of something tasty and enjoyable you might do with their product.

A good name conjures no negative images or connotations.

A good name is easy to spell and say. Timex. PlayStation. Sunkist.

A good name contains no generic words or words that appear in the
names of other businesses. Look up "neologism", a made-up word that
your brand can "own" not only legally but also in the mind of the
customer. Brand names are sometimes formed by combining two ordinary words. MicroSoft. Brand names have been formed by deliberately misspelling a common word. Orbitz. 

A good name doesn't confuse people, doesn't look or sound like someother organization's name.
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If you live in the city limits of St. Albans and you support the goals and methods of neighborhood watch as a means of improving the city of St Albans, join "Public Group For St. Albans Neighborhood Watch" on Facebook at ::https://www.facebook.com/groups/PublicGroupForSt.AlbansNeighborhoodWatch/.

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Higginbotham At Large only publishes the comments of clearly identified submitters. I am not interested in the opinions of cowards who hide behind CB handles and I will not publish them.  By "clearly identified" I mean something like this: JosephHigginbotham@gmail.com. No Ring of Gyges for you.

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Suzette Raines Speaks At St. Albans Ward 4 Neighborhood Watch In Just One Week

St. Albans and District 35 House member, Suzette Raines, will speak and answer voter questions at the 6:30PM Tuesday September 3 meeting of the St. Albans ward 4 neighborhood watch to be hosted by Crossing Church, 2031 Harrison Ave.

Candid Advice On Starting A Neighborhood Watch

The first thing you need when starting up a neighborhood watch is a fast and free way to communicate with the people in your defined neighborhood. That means smart phone numbers and email addresses so you can simply add people to phone groups and email groups and send emails and texts to a lot of people simultaneously.

Unless somebody gives you a database containing the names, email addresses and smart phone numbers of all the neighbors in your neighborhood, a start up neighborhood watch's first and primary job is to identify the residents of the defined neighborhood and capture their contact information. And by "contact information" I mean smart phone and email. 

Many new neighborhood watch groups make the mistake of either sending mailers to the homes of people within the defined neighborhood or going door to door and leaving invitations to the next meeting but failing to capture a way to communicate with those people fast and free. 

Sending mailers is too expensive and yields few new members.

Inviting people to a meeting is a waste of time unless you also capture their email addresses and smart phone numbers. 

If you don't get the smart phone numbers and the email addresses you have to go back out and knock on doors or you have to spend money on USPS mailings every time you need to tell people something.

Don't get the cart before the horse: collect contact information first, then worry about how to get people to meetings, appointing block captains and such. Get the fast, free way to communicate first. Collect the email addresses and smart phone numbers.

If a neighbor doesn't have a way to receive email or text, get their old-fashioned dumb phone number.

At meetings, make sure you don't let anyone leave without giving up their email and smart phone info. Odds are you'll only get one bite at that apple because so many people attend one meeting then never return. Here's what I do: I get two or three people to help me hand a pen and paper to each person as they enter the room. We ask for name, street address, phone and email. Don't let anyone attend anonymously. Think about it: it's neighborhood watch. Neighbors have to identify each other. When I collect new names and contact info I update may master Excel spreadsheet and email that file to everyone who gave me their email address. In some neighborhood watch groups, the only person who has the contact information is the coordinator. This is insane. If neighbors don't have each other's contact info it's not a neighborhood watch. 

Don't let low attendance or a low return rate discourage you. If you collect the email addresses and the smart phone info you have a chance to demonstrate the value of the watch program. When people start receiving your texts and emails about bad guys who have been caught and crimes that have been stopped because vigilant neighbors communicated with each other and with police, they'll see the value of participating in neighborhood watch. 

Don't be stupid: concentrate all your start up effort on identifying everybody in the neighborhood and capturing their contact information. Unless your city already has this date and will share it with you, you'll have to collect it the hard way, door-to-door. Don't be shy about asking. I can tell you from personal experience that nearly 100% of the people who answer their door will give you the information you request.

When you come home with a page full of names, street addresses, phone numbers and email addresses, enter that information in your email group, your text group and into a master list. I use Excel to make a spreadsheet containing every bit of data I have collected. 

Do the hard work of going door to door and asking for email addresses and text numbers FIRST. Don't waste time and money mailing flyers to residents' homes. They won't reply. Once you've collected email addresses and text numbers from a significant percentage of your neighborhood's residents, you'll always have a way to get your message out - meeting announcements, police tips, suspicious activities - anything. 
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HigginbothamAtLarge reads all submitted comments but only publishes comments from clearly identified submitters. No Ring of Gyges for you.

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How To Remain Informed About St. Albans Neighborhood Watch And The News Of Your Ward

Instead of fliers stuck to your doors or in your gates, start looking for meeting announcements and other St. Albans Neighborhood Watch news in the Charleston Newspapers and in the St. Albans Monthly.  Since neighborhood watch groups are not funded by the city, we need FREE ways to reach out and inform our neighborhoods. 
Debbie Shull, owner of the St. Albans Monthly, gave us a lot of free space in the current (June) issue and we really appreciate it. 

Look for us on Facebook. "Like" our page "The Saint Albans Neighborhood Watch, St. Albans, WV" and join our group "Public Group For St. Albans, WV, Neighborhood Watch".

We have both a page and a group for this reason: No matter how the Googler spells the name of our town (Saint or St.) the page shows up in a Google search and directs the Googler to our group. We want you to join the group because members get notifications when new things are posted.

In addition to joining the "Public Group For St. Albans, WV, Neighborhood Watch", there are two other groups we recommend: On Facebook, join the "St. Albans Police Department" group. Captain James Agee of the SAPD runs this group and it's a good forum to discuss everything from stolen property to lost pets to meth lab busts and other arrests.

On Linkedin, join LinkedSt.Albans. LinkedSt.Albans is a discussion forum about all things St. Albans. 

People who attend a meeting and give us their smart phone numbers and email addresses are added to our roster. It's essential that all members know how to reach one another so rosters are updated each month and sent in Excel format to members who have given us their email addresses.