{"id":1346,"date":"2013-10-03T11:33:05","date_gmt":"2013-10-03T11:33:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.listenandlearn.org\/blog\/?p=1346"},"modified":"2013-10-03T12:10:21","modified_gmt":"2013-10-03T12:10:21","slug":"the-death-of-a-brand-name-google-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.listenandlearn.org\/blog\/the-death-of-a-brand-name-google-it\/","title":{"rendered":"The Death of a Brand Name – Google It!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Branding1\"<\/a>We are bombarded with marketing everywhere we go, and sometimes it is so effective that the product itself becomes a noun or a verb, often to the detriment of the company, but to the benefit of the competition \u2013 let\u2019s check out some examples of this happening today.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not surprising the brand name Sellotape stuck when referring to transparent, cellulose-based, pressure sensitive adhesive tape - let\u2019s face it, it\u2019s not such a mouthful. But it\u2019s not the only brand name product that has become a common noun \u2013 there are a lot more out there than you realise!<\/p>\n

From Lino to iPod, Google to Frisbee, Hoover to Jeep, and Styrofoam to Kleenex, we are constantly surrounded by brand names and trademarks that have become so representative of the product\u00a0that we don\u2019t even realise we have become complicit with the marketing machine!<\/p>\n

This has been happening since brand names were invented, and usually occurs when the product dominates the market to such an extent that consumers associate the name with the product type, and thus a noun or verb is born. For instance, if you saw a flying disc you\u2019d call it a Frisbee, when in fact it could be one that\u2019s not actually trademarked by the Frisbee company.<\/p>\n

Possibly the earliest case of this happening is Linoleum, which has been shortened to Lino in every day parlance. The floor covering was originally named by Frederick Walton in 1864, and following a lawsuit for trademark infringement in 1878, was ruled as generic.<\/p>\n

The reason Mr Walton fought so hard was due to this argument: when a trademark\/brand name becomes known as a household object\/product, consumers don\u2019t differentiate between the product owners and their competition \u2013 this has been coined (somewhat mockingly) as brand genericide<\/i>.<\/p>\n

\"branding2\"<\/a>A couple of more recent examples include the iPod. Have you ever heard anyone ask \u201cWhat\u2019s playing on your MP3 player these days?<\/i>\u201d And Google has become so synonymous with the usage of a search engine\u00a0that it officially became a verb recognised by the Oxford English Dictionary in 2006.<\/p>\n

The Google organisation has tried so hard to fight this brand genericide that it currently contacts publications that refer to searching online as \u2018Googling\u2019, and has even tried (and failed) to stop it happening in a legal arena. But as it has become a colloquialism with the common folk, the company has lost control of the situation, and will pretty much just have to live with it now.<\/p>\n

So, although most marketing companies can only dream of their product having such a large amount of recognition, the irony is that when they do, product sales can drop, and their competitors usually benefit.<\/p>\n

Aspirin, Roller Blades, Biro, Chapstick, Yo-Yo, and Thermos have all suffered the same fate; can you think of any others?<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We are bombarded with marketing everywhere we go, and sometimes it is so effective that the product itself becomes a noun or a verb, often to the detriment of the company, but to the benefit of the competition \u2013 let\u2019s check out some examples of this happening today. It\u2019s not surprising the brand name Sellotape(\u2026)<\/p>\n

\n
\n\t \t\t\t\tCONTINUE READING »<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":1344,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,9],"tags":[121,124,120,122,123,125],"class_list":["post-1346","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-politics-religion-history-law","category-technology","tag-brands","tag-frisbee","tag-genericide","tag-google","tag-lino","tag-oed"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Death of a Brand Name - Google It! - Listen & Learn<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.listenandlearn.org\/blog\/the-death-of-a-brand-name-google-it\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Death of a Brand Name - Google It! - Listen & Learn\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"We are bombarded with marketing everywhere we go, and sometimes it is so effective that the product itself becomes a noun or a verb, often to the detriment of the company, but to the benefit of the competition \u2013 let\u2019s check out some examples of this happening today. 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