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Snowball.com is changing its name:
Why generic brand names should not
be in anyone's branding strategy.

SAN FRANCISCO, May 10, 2002. A Snowball's chance... Reuters reports that one of the few Internet bubble high-flyers to have survived the implosion, Snowball.com, is changing its name to IGN Entertainment as of this Thursday, "to reflect its focus on video gaming news and information." And, of course, to shed that pesky ".com" suffix.

IGN chief executive Mark Jung pointed out that of all the various markets his company caters to, the one for used video games and accessories is what really has them in a lather: "There is a lot of latent currency tied up in this used product sitting on bedroom shelves," he said.

And then some. It's ironic that so many Internet companies which chose to append ".com" to their names a few years back when all things ".com" were the rage, are now - if they are still in business - dropping that withered appendage like a hot potato.

We suspect that trademark difficulties played a part in the original decisions - plain descriptors were the vogue because companies thought such names would translate into instant massive web traffic, but they weren't able to obtain trademarks on words like "pets," drugstore," or "business." However, since the trademark office was blindsided by the new Internet era, companies were able to slap ".com" onto the ends of their descriptive words and sail right through the trademark process, and that could be how Pets.com, Drugstore.com and Business.com were born.

"Snowball" is a much more evocative word than any of those examples, but it shared the same problem - the company probably couldn't get a trademark for "Snowball" by itself. Of course, they are also re-positioning themselves, to bury the association with their past money-losing business and go after new gold. IGN is fortunate to be able to do that, even if the new name is lackluster, since other .coms - Drugstore.com for example - are pretty much stuck with their descriptive .com names: if they amputate the ".com," they probably can't get a trademark, but if they scrap their name altogether, they lose the generic brand they've spent so much money trying to establish.

Which goes to show why generic brand names never work in the end, because they have no story to tell, and Internet navigation trends will never replace the value of a good story.