A plain-English glossary of the science that decides how a brand name lands, sound symbolism, processing fluency, optimal incongruity and the rest, each defined with the research behind it.
The choice was never safe or polarizing. It is where your name sits on one curve, and the names that win break the category's pattern just enough to be noticed while staying easy to say.
Most naming guides chase the wrong target. Fifty years of linguistic research says polarizing beats memorable, and the sound a name makes does more work than the meaning. Here's what to do instead.