Chinese brand naming from general principles to specific rules

Chinese brand naming: from general principles to specific rules

Yue Yuan Huang Allan K.K. Chan 6,338 words 1 November 1997International Journal of Advertising320 Vol. 16, No. 4, ISSN: 0265-0487 EnglishCOPYRIGHT 1997 Advertising Association

INTRODUCTION

A brand name is the identification of a particular product or service. It is among the most important assets which a firm possesses (Aaker, 1991; Aaker & Keller, 1990). Brand names play a crucial role in the marketing of products and services and in their acceptance by the public (Charmasson, 1988), and may contribute significantly to the success or failure of new products or services (Kotler & Armstrong, 1997; Zaltman & Wallendorf, 1979). Recent studies have shown that branding has increasingly become part of an integrated business process (Mosmans, 1995; Rubinstein, 1995). Mosmans (1995) further argues that the focus now is on value creation rather than product creation, and one of the most important tasks of a firm is to build brand concept that drives the business.

Brand names play an even more significant role in Asian countries. Robinson (1995), for example, points out that many Asian packaged goods markets are characterized by an unusual level of single brand dominance. Very often one brand can account for 40-50 per cent market share and can hold this share position for many years. So entrenched are some brands that in many instances they have become the category. This phenomenon of significant brand dominance and entrenched market shares has been attributed to shared Asian cultural values. Based on Hofstede's multicultural attitude survey in 1980, Robinson (1995) summarizes three key cultural dimensions to account for this brand loyalty in Asian markets: power distance, recognition and uncertainty avoidance (for details, see Robinson, 1995: 56-58).

Creating a powerful brand name is a very important process in the business. Studies on branding have focused on the guideline criteria for developing effective brand

names: the short length, the ease of pronunciation, the packaging needs, the adaptability to advertising medium, and so on (Charmasson, 1988; Collins, 1977; McCarthy & Perreault, 1987; McNeal & Zeren, 1981; Shipley et al., 1988). These studies have been largely conducted in Western countries, such as in the USA and Europe, and on the products which are branded in Western European languages. However, recent studies have found that language difference is critically important in the international environment and may cause major barriers to international market entry to some countries, such as Japan (Simon & Palder, 1987; Cravens et al., 1987). McDonald and Roberts (1990) start to question the applicability of Western brand naming models in the Asia Pacific context. However, few studies focus on how culture and linguistic diversity is related to brand naming.

This study investigates the Chinese brand system by analysing the brand names of a representative sample of award-winning products in the People's Republic of China (referred to as China hereafter). China is probably the largest consumer market in international business today and the Chinese language differs greatly from Western European languages. Unlike Western European languages, Chinese with a logographic writing system cannot coin a name by scrambling some alphabetic letters as often applied in English naming processes. All Chinese names are constructed from meaningful words; thus the creativity of Chinese brand names reflects certain Chinese cultural values. Asian societies which Robinson (1995) refers to as primarily Confucian-influenced societies share basic cultural values. A good understanding of the attitude of the Chinese people has a direct implication for the understanding of Asian customers.

The focus of this article is on the linguistic nature of Chinese brand naming. There are two specific objectives: to generalize the linguistic principles which govern branding in Chinese, and to categorize the specific branding rules for specific products. The article is divided into four parts. First, we will discuss in detail the criteria for powerful brand names, especially the essential linguistic requirements in branding. Second, we will summarize the general linguistic rules governing Chinese branding based on our recent study of 527 brand names of Chinese award-winning products from Beijing and Shanghai (Chan & Huang, 1997). The third part presents results of our current study on 151 top Chinese brands of two specific categories of products: cosmetic products and bicycles, in order to compare the specific name formation rules for different products. The fourth part is the conclusion. The findings of this study will help local marketers to generate a good Chinese brand name, and

international marketers to properly localize an international brand name in Chinese in order to enhance business success in the Chinese market.

THE CRITERIA FOR POWERFUL BRAND NAMES

Many studies have dealt with the criteria for a good and powerful brand name. However, the criteria vary among researchers with respect to the number of items. Kotler and Armstrong (1997) listed five criteria, Collins (1977) named six, McCarthy and Perreault (1987) provided a list of twelve characteristics while McNeal and Zeren (1981) suggested thirteen.(1) There is also a lack of consistency in the terms used for the criteria. For example, McNeal and Zeren used `ease of pronunciation', while McCarthy and Perreault used `easy to spell and read'. In our recent article, we proposed a three-component criterion which captures the generality of the principles in branding (Chan & Huang, 1997). We classified the desirable qualities for a good brand name under three components: marketing, legal and linguistic, as shown in Table 1.

Table 1 A three-component criterion for the development of brand

names

The marketing component

* Suggestive of product benefits

* Promotable, advertisable and persuasive

* Suited to package

* Fits with company image and other products' image

The legal component

* Legally available for use (not in use by another firm)

* Unique in competition

The linguistic component

There are three sub-components:

1 The phonetic requirements

* easy to pronounce

* Pleasing when read or heard

* Pronounceable in only one way and in all languages for goods

to be exported

2 The morphological requirements

* Short and simple

3 The semantic requirements

* Positive, not offensive, obscene, or negative

* Modern or contemporary, always timely

* Understandable and memorable

Source: Chan & Huang (1997)

We argued that the linguistic component is the essence in branding which directly affects the function of brand names. The function of brands is to make the branded products or services recognizable and distinguishable for promotion and selling in the market. A brand competes better when it is legally protected from the adaptation and imitation by any potential competitors. However, the degree of market promotion and legal protection that can be derived from the use of a commercial name depends almost entirely upon the intrinsic characteristics of the syllables, word and phrases (Charmasson, 1988).

The linguistic component in branding consists of three sub-components: phonetic content, morphological content and semantic content. For the products which are intended for the international market, their branding must take linguistic universals into consideration, i.e., the linguistic traits which occur in all or most human languages.

Phonetic requirements

A good brand name is usually easy to pronounce and pleasing when read or heard. Three factors affect the pronunciation of a brand: the choice of speech sounds, the syllable structure and sonority. The choice of sounds can affect the recognition of brand names. Vanden Bergh (1983) found that 46.5 per cent of the top 200 US brands in 1979 started with a plosive.(2) Vanden Bergh et al. (1984) argued that words that began with a plosive were more frequently recalled and more likely to be recognized than words that did not.

Syllable structure is directly related to the ease of pronunciation. Languages differ in syllable structure. Some languages, such as Mandarin Chinese, have very simple syllable structures of CV (C stands for consonant and V for vowel) or CVC, while other languages have a complicated syllable structure with a freedom to consonant clusters. For example, English allows a syllable of CCCVCC (e.g. splint). Consonant clusters cause difficulty in pronunciation not only to the speakers whose language does not allow consonant clusters, but also to the speakers whose language permits the combination of consonants because different languages permit different combinations of consonants. A good brand should avoid such combinations. We analysed the world's most powerful brand names, the top ten brands in United States, Europe and Japan, respectively (for example, Coca-Cola, Sony, Disney, Kodak, Toyota; for details see Kotler & Armstrong, 1997: 249),(3) and found that the predominant syllable structure of this group of brands is CV and CVC. Except for Black & Decker, none of the rest begins with a consonant cluster. Researchers also found that certain syllables may be more preferred than others in a certain speech community. For example, Japanese speakers consider that chi, tsu and pi sounded strong, cheerful and pleasing while zu, da and gu sounded melancholic and dull (Sternberg, 1989).

Sonority affects the pleasantness of names. The degree of sonority depends on speech sounds and tones. Vowels are more sonorous than consonants because vowels are produced with relatively little obstruction in the vocal tract while consonants are produced with a narrow or complete closure in the vocal tract (Fromkin & Rodman, 1993). Tones are related with pitches. Phonetically, high tones mean high pitches; therefore they are more sonorous, while low tones have low pitches with less sonority. In the studies of Chinese personal names, it is found that Chinese personal naming is guided by two criteria: sonorous and meaningful (Huang & Fan, 1994), and the two high tones in Cantonese Chinese are preferably used in the names of Hong Kong Cantonese speakers (Fan & Ng, 1993).

Morphological requirements

The morphological requirement constrains the length of brand names. Naming process in general adopts word formation procedures, such as compounding, affixation, abbreviation, blending, and so on. Languages differ in word formation. Chinese uses compounding in naming, the same process as its word formation. English is different. Carroll's study (1985) showed that native English speakers clearly preferred simple nominals to compound nominate in English names.

Semantic requirements

Semantically, names with positive connotation are overwhelmingly preferred cross-culturally. Positiveness affects the impression of a commercial name on customers. People are more pleased to receive positive input than negative. Another important semantic property in naming is the establishment of a specific semantic framework for a specific category of products. Aronoff (1985) pointed out in his study of American car names that car manufacturers deliberately manipulate the names of car makes and models within automobile semantics for the purpose of the shifts of ranking, and American customers are led to accept the new meanings without notice because the overall conceptual framework remains constant.

Linguistic universals

Linguistic universals are very important for branding the products which are intended for the global market. Language universals regulate what is possible and what is impossible in the structure of a language and provide information on the characteristics which are found in all or most of the world's languages and the characteristics which are not found in any. Following the markedness theory which is often used to analyse linguistic universals, linguistic features which are basic and can be commonly found in many languages are unmarked characteristics while more complex and universally rarer features are marked traits.

In a phonetic system, the unmarked vowels are [a, i, u] which almost every language contains. The unmarked consonants are stops [p, t, k] and the unmarked syllable structure is CV. The interdental fricatives [[Theta], [Differential]] in English as in three, those are the two marked phonemes and difficult for speakers of many other languages who very often use [s, z] or [t, d] to substitute them (for details of language universals, see Greenberg, 1978). To achieve the requirement of `pronounceable in all languages' and `pronounceable in only one way', the brand designers must consider

the language universal features and avoid marked sounds and syllables. Imagine importing the French long-established PSCHITT soda pop label into an English-speaking country (Charmasson, 1988:31). Not only may its initial consonant combination psch cause some difficulty for English speakers to pronounce, but its sound which is close to the English word `shit' will very possibly result in negative feeling among English speakers. With respect to semantics, brand designers who are interested in the global market must therefore be aware of homonyms of certain words in different languages in order to avoid embarrassing situations. A positively connoted name in one language may sound offensive in another language.

THE GENERAL LINGUISTIC PRINCIPLES GOVERNING CHINESE BRANDING

Specific features of the Chinese language

The Chinese language differs from Indo-European languages and has the following specific features:

1 Chinese is an isolating language; that is, words in Chinese consist of a single morpheme, and there are only a few affixes in Chinese. A morpheme in Chinese has only one syllable and is represented by one character in the written form. Thus there is a unification: a word, one morpheme, one syllable, one character. The word formation in modern Chinese is mainly through compounding; that is, combining two or more existing words.

2 Chinese has a very simple syllable structure system: CV or CVC.

3 Chinese is a tone language. In Mandarin Chinese, there are four distinct tones. Dividing the pitch range into five levels numbered 1 to 5, where 1 corresponds to the low pitch, 3 to the middle pitch and 5 to the high pitch, we get the following Mandarin tone representation:

Tone 1 (T1) high tone 55

Tone 2 (T2) rising tone 35

Tone 3 (T3) dipping tone 214

Tone 4 (T4) falling tone 51

T1 and T2 have a common feature; that is, both have a high pitch end (5), so we may group them as high tones (H). T3 and T4 are both involved with the lowest pitch (1) in their falling contour and we may group them as low tones (L).(4)

4 All Chinese words including vocabulary used every day, personal names, place names and brand names are all constructed from the same source of meaningful morphemes. There are about 9400 morphemes generally used in Chinese, of which 3500 are frequently used.(5) Most new words or names in modern Chinese are compounded from these 3500 morphemes. However, in English there is an inventory of personal names independent of its lexicon.

The syllabic, semantic and morphological patterns in Chinese branding

Our recent study (Chan & Huang, 1997) analysed 527 brand names of Chinese national award-winning products from two major cities: Shanghai and Beijing. The sample is selected from a corpus entitled Zhongguo Chuangyou Qunxing (The Best Products in China from 1979 to 1988) (1990).(6) The products include textiles, food, industrial products, clothing, daily necessities, pharmaceutical products, and so on. These data were analysed under four linguistic categories: the syllabic structure, the tonic structure, the morphological structure and the semantic structure. The results are summarized in Tables 2, 3, 4 and 5.

Table 2 Syllable structure of brand names in China

Syllables Frequency Percentage Ranking

Two syllables 477 90.50 1

Three syllables 34 6.45 2

One syllable 11 2.10 3

Four syllables 5 0.95 4

Total 527 100

Table 3 Tone structure of brand names in China

Tone patterns Frequency Percentage Ranking

H-H 74 47.13 1

L-H 40 25.48 2

H-L 29 18.47 3

L-L 14 8.91 4

Total 157 100

Table 4 Compounding structure of brand names in China

Compounding types Frequency Percentage Ranking

Noun-noun 272 51.61 1

Adjective-noun 53 10.06 2

Number-noun 48 9.11 3

Verb-noun 36 6.83 4

Other ten types 118 22.39

Total 527 100

Table 5 Semantic structure of brand names in China

Semantic connotation Frequency Percentage Ranking

Positive 348 66.03 1

Neutral 178 33.78 2

Negative 1 0.18 3

Total 527 100

The findings have shown an overwhelming preference (90.5 per cent) to two-syllable (disyllable) names in Chinese branding; that is, the names are compounded by two words. The disyllabism in branding reflects the general syllable preference of Chinese speakers. In modern Chinese, disyllabic compounds make up about 70 per cent of

basic vocabulary. Thus two-syllable brand names are easy for Chinese speakers to remember and to recognize. With respect to the tonic structure of two-syllable brands, Chinese speakers especially like high-pitched (H-H) syllables and accept L-H brands very well. H-H combinations (47.13 per cent) and L-H (25.48 per cent) together termed as X-H (X is either H or L) make up to 72.61 per cent of our brand corpus. High-pitched words are sonorous. A combination of L-H can achieve a sonorous effect by ending with a high-pitched sound. The high sonority of names can result in pleasing features in pronunciation. Chinese branding has no restriction in compounding structure and there are altogether fourteen compounding types in our corpus. However, Noun-Noun compounded names (51.61 per cent) is the most favoured combination, followed by adjective-noun, number-noun and verb-noun. These four groups which make up 77.61 per cent in our brand corpus have a common feature of modifier-noun; that is, the second component of the name is a noun and the first functions as a modifier to this noun. Semantically, it is the positive names (66.3 per cent) which are most frequently used. These most preferred linguistic features are summarized in Table 6.

Table 6 The four most preferred patterns

Two-syllable X-H tone Modifier-noun Positive

90.50% 72.61% 77.61% 66.03%

To summarize, Chinese brand names are compounds and the branding is generally governed by four linguistic principles:

* It should be a two-syllable compound.

* The second syllable should be high-pitched.

* The compounding structure should follow the pattern of modifier-noun. The compounded brand should have a positive connotation.

Brands Syllable Tones

hong-qi (car) `red-flag' 2 H-H

bai-mao (detergent) `white-cat' 2 H-H

fei-ge (bicycle) `flying-pigeon' 2 H-H

chang-cheng (wine) `great-wall' 2 H-H

Brands Compounding Connotation

structure

hong-qi (car) Adjective-Noun positive

bai-mao (detergent) Adjective-Noun positive

fei-ge (bicycle) Adjective-Noun positive

chang-cheng (wine) Adjective-Noun positive

BRANDING RULES FOR SPECIFIC PRODUCTS

With the above generalized linguistic principals governing Chinese branding, we have further investigated the creativity of branding for specific categories of products; that is, how brand name rules differentiate for different products. We did a content analysis of two very different groups of products: bicycles and cosmetic goods, to see how the two specific branding rules are similar to and differ from each other within the framework of the general principles.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This study used a corpus entitled Zhongguo Mingpai Shangpin Daquan: Xiaofeipin Juan (China Top Brands - Consumer Goods) (1994)(7) as the source of data. About 2000 Chinese top and award-winning consumer goods up to 1994 are documented in this corpus. We selected bicycles and cosmetic goods for analysis and comparison. There are two reasons for choosing these two categories. First, the bicycle industry and the cosmetic industry in China have undergone a tremendous development since the start of the new economic policy of the Chinese government, and there are many new products in these two categories. Second, these two groups of products differ in the nature of function. Therefore, the branding of these two categories must take the consideration of distinctive features of the two different kinds of products to make them distinguishable in the market.

All the bicycles and cosmetic brands in the corpus are included in the sample for analysis. The family brand names which apply to different products in the same category are treated as one single entry to avoid multiple counting. The sample for our

analysis has altogether 151 brands: 66 brands of bicycles and 85 brands of cosmetic goods. The content analysis of these 151 brands can be described in two steps. The first step is the analysis of the syllabic, tonic, morphological and semantic patterns of the two groups with the comparison to the general principles we summarized in the above section. The second step is the comparison of the specific branding rules of these two category products in terms of their use of animal names, foreign-sounding names, flower names, abstract nouns or concrete nouns.

THE FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

The comparison of the general branding principles with the specific branding rules

First, let us look at the comparison of the brand naming patterns of the two products of bicycles and cosmetic products with the general preferred patterns in Table 5 in terms of two-syllable, X-H tone combination, modifier-noun and positive connotation. The result of the comparison is presented in Table 7 and Figure 1. Top Chinese bicycle and cosmetic brands follow the general branding patterns, and show a strong tendency for disyllabism, H-H or L-H tone combinations, modifier-noun compounding structure and positive connotation. However, there are four noticeable differences between them:

* There are many more positively connoted bicycle (87.88 per cent) and cosmetic (97.65 per cent) brands than products in general (66.3 per cent).

* There are fewer X-H tone combinations in bicycle (63.64 per cent) and cosmetic (61.54 per cent) brands than in the general pattern (72.61 per cent).

* There are fewer two-syllabled brands in cosmetic production (76.48 per cent) than in the general pattern (90.50 per cent).

* There are fewer modifier-noun cosmetic brands (67.69 per cent) than in the general pattern (77.61 per cent).

[Figure 1 ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Table 7 The comparison of the general branding principles

with the specific branding rules

Two-syllable (%) X-H tone (%)

Products 90.50 72.61

Bicycles 93.94 63.64

Cosmetics 76.48 61.54

Modifier-noun (%) Positive (%)

Products 77.61 66.03

Bicycles 79.03 87.88

Cosmetics 67.69 97.65

The first two differences are actually correlated. The third and fourth differences are another related pair. We will analyse the two groups separately. The interesting correlation between increased positive connotation and decreased X-H tone combination in bicycle and cosmetic brands reflects the creativity in the brand formation for specific products within the general branding rules. Both bicycle and cosmetic products (shampoo, cream, etc.) are the two most important necessities in Chinese people's daily life. The requirement for a bicycle from Chinese consumers' point of view is its reliability: its strength and long life. The requirement for cosmetic products is their immediate effectiveness on beautifying the body. Thus for these two categories of consumer goods, it is the positive promise that plays the most crucial role in attracting consumers in the market. Since the primary consideration is on the positiveness in selecting and compounding meaningful names for these two kinds of products, the requirement for sonority sometimes has to give in to the priority of positiveness, and it thus results in the correlation between increased positive connotation and decreased X-H tone combination.

The variation of cosmetic branding from the general rules in syllable structure and compounding structure reflects one special feature of cosmetic branding, which is unconventionality. Some 22.35 per cent of cosmetic brands are three-syllabled compared with 6.45 per cent in the general pattern and 1.52 per cent in bicycle brands. In terms of the compounding structure, 27.69 per cent are in the form of modifier-adjective, in which the adjective is the head of the name. In contrast, only 6.64 per cent in the general pattern and 4.84 per cent of bicycle brands have the structure of modifier-adjective.

The comparison of bicycle branding with cosmetic branding

We showed in the above that cosmetic branding and bicycle branding differs significantly in syllable structure and compounding structure. The two sets of brands are very different in the choice of words for naming as well. In this section, we analyse their differences in the selection of animal names, flower names, the names with a structure of modifier-noun, in which the head noun is a concrete noun (such as jade, horse, star), and foreign-sounding names.

By foreign-sounding names we mean the names which are written in Chinese characters, but obviously are not ordinary Chinese names. A foreign-sounding name differs from a Chinese name in two ways. First, modern Chinese names are dominantly two-syllabled. A name with three or more syllables is very possibly a non-Chinese name. Second, the second component of a two-syllabled Chinese name largely functions as the head of the compounded name; that is, the two components of the name are structured with the first component as a kind of modifier and the second component as the head to be modified (e.g. chun-jiang: spring-river). Therefore, the semantic relationship between the components is easily constructed. This is one of the reasons that Chinese names are mostly meaningful. Foreign-sounding names, either two-syllabled names or names of more than two syllables, do not follow this structure restriction and semantically have no meanings. Besides, the words chosen for foreign-sounding names are usually more abstract, or not frequently used words in modern Chinese (for example, nuo-fei-ya: promise-humble-relatives; both fei and ya are the words in the old Chinese and are not used at all in modern Chinese compound formation).

Table 8 and Figure 2 present the difference between cosmetic branding and bicycle branding in terms of their use of foreign-sounding names, animal names, flower names and the use of concrete nouns. Except for the similar use of flower names, the two sets of brands are very different in other respects. There is a strong tendency to use foreign-sounding names (27.6 per cent) in cosmetic brands. Most of these foreign-sounding names are in three syllables which makes cosmetic brands very distinctive from other brands that are overwhelmingly two-syllabled. The favourite words in cosmetic branding are li and mei: both mean beautiful. In our corpus, there are twelve cosmetic brands with the word li, and ten with the word med. Words in cosmetic brands in general either directly mean beautiful, or have a connotation of beautiful value (for example, bi `green', jing `clean', bai `white). Bicycles in contrast follow very traditional Chinese naming. They show a strong preference for animal names in branding (51.52 per cent) and for the compounding pattern of modifier-noun with the head as a concrete noun (72.73 per cent). The favourite words in this group of brands

are fei `flying' and jin `golden'. In our sample, there are fifteen brand names of bicycles including the word fei and six with jin. Most words in bicycle brands are concrete nouns, the words related to real and existing objects which have the quality of strength and speed, such as, guang `light', ying `eagle', ma `horse', shan `mountain', yun `cloud', and shi `lion'.

[Figure 2 ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Table 8 The comparison of cosmetic branding with bicycle branding

Foreign-sounding Animal names

names

(%) (%)

Cosmetics 27.6 8.24

Bicycles 4.55 51.52

Flower names Modifier-noun

(concrete nouns)

(%) (%)

Cosmetics 8.24 27.06

Bicycles 7.58 72.73

The role of the semantic field in specific branding rules

Bicycle and cosmetic branding are guided by the general linguistic principles in Chinese brand naming and consistently show a preference for positively connoted two-syllabled names which have a modifier-noun compounding structure with the second component being high-pitched. However, each branding creates a specific set of rules within the general framework to distinguish each from the other. We propose that it is the semantic field that determines the creativity in individual brand name formation in Chinese. A semantic field consists of a group of semantically related words which are applicable to a common conceptual domain and these words are organized within a semantic field by relation of affinity and contrast (Kittay & Lehrer,

1992). The semantic field in branding a category of products is made up of a class of semantically related words associated with some characteristics or requirements of this kind of product.

The significantly distinguished feature between bicycle brand names and cosmetic names is their selection of the words in two different semantic domains. The basic requirements for a good bicycle are toughness and speed. The bicycle brands in our analysis are overwhelmingly dominated by words related to toughness and speed. Some 66.7 per cent of bicycle brands have either selected the words related to toughness (for example, lion, dragon, crocodile, eagle, mountain, forever, elephant, etc.) or related to speed (flying, arrow, angel, bird, butterfly, deer, light, fish, etc.). In contrast, cosmetic products are characterized by fragrance and required for beautifying effects, so it is the words related to beauty and fragrance that dominate the cosmetic brands. Some 78.82 per cent of the cosmetic brands in our sample used beauty-related words (pretty, fragrant, jade, elegant, etc.), or with romantic connotations (love, dream, miss, etc.). The preference for foreign-sounding names in cosmetics demonstrates further the role of the semantic field in branding. To Chinese consumers, foreign-sounding female names have a clear connotation of stylishness, richness, beauty, elegance, or eroticism.

The decisive role of the semantic field in branding an individual category of products can account for the variation of cosmetic brands from the general linguistic patterns which we discussed in the earlier section. Cosmetic brands are over 30 per cent higher than the general pattern in selection of positive names, but around 10 per cent lower than the general patterns in disyllabic structure, H-H/L-H tone combination, and modifier-noun compounds. To satisfy the need of the semantic field for beauty, elegance, romanticism, which are abstract in meaning and mainly presented in adjectives, or connoted in foreign-sounding names, the branding has to give in its requirement on sonority, syllable structure and compounding pattern to a certain degree.

CONCLUSION

The linguistic aspect of a brand name is the essence in branding and is of particular importance for the success of a product. There are four general linguistic principles guiding Chinese branding. Morphologically, Chinese branding is a two-component (two-syllabled) compounding. With respect to the internal structure, the compounded name should follow the pattern of modifier-noun. Phonetically, the second component

of the compounded name should be high-pitched. Semantically, the compounded brand should have a positive connotation. Branding rules for the individual category of products are guidelined by the general principles, and at the same time determined by the semantic field that is closely related to the characteristics of that category of products. It is this decisive factor of the semantic field that differentiates brand names of different products. The understanding of these principles and rules governing Chinese branding will help marketers and advertisers in developing good Chinese brand names for local products, and in localizing international brands for the Chinese market as well.

NOTES

(1) Kotler and Armstrong's five desirable qualities (1997):

1 It should suggest something about the product's benefits and qualities.

2 It should be easy to pronounce, recognize and remember.

3 It should be distinctive.

4 It should translate easily into foreign languages.

5 It should be capable of registration and legal protection.

Collins's six criteria (1977):

1 Unique.

2 Remindful of the product category.

3 Easy to read in all the countries in which the brand is to be marketed.

4 Easy to pronounce.

5 Of such a verbal form as to have semantic and/or symbolic associations,

i.e. to convey feeling.

6 Be capable of continuation despite changed circumstances.

McCarthy and Perreault's twelve criteria (1987: 239):

1 Short and simple.

2 Easy to spell and read.

3 Easy to recognize and remember.

4 Pleasing when read or heard -- and easy to pronounce.

5 Pronounceable in only one way.

6 Pronounceable in all languages (for goods to be exported).

7 Always timely (does not go out of date).

8 Adaptable to packaging or labelling needs.

9 Legally available for use (not in use by another firm).

10 Not offensive, obscene or negative.

11 Suggestive of product benefits.

12 Adaptable to any advertising medium.

McNeal and Zeren's thirteen criteria (1981: 87):

1 Descriptive of product benefits.

2 Memorable.

3 Fits with company image and other products' image.

4 Trademark available.

5 Promotable and advertisable.

6 Uniqueness versus competition.

7 Length.

8 Ease of pronunciation.

9 Positive connotations to potential users.

10 Suited to package.

11 Modern or contemporary.

12 Understandable.

13 Persuasive.

(2) Plosives are oral stops including: P, B, T, D, K, G. In producing a plosive, the air that is blocked in the mouth explodes when the closure is released.

(3) According to Kotler and Armstrong (1997: 249), Landor Associates, an image consulting firm, conducted a survey of 9000 consumers in the United States, Western Europe and Japan about their familiarity with and esteem for more than 6000 brands. From the results, Landor developed `brand image-power' rankings. Listed below are the top ten brands for each part of the world.

The world's most powerful brand names

United States Europe Japan

Coca-Cola Coca-Cola Sony

Campbell Sony National

Disney Mercedes-Benz Mercedes-Benz

Pepsi-Cola BMW Toyota

Kodak Philips Takashimaya

NBC Volkswagen Rolls-Royce

Black & Decker Adidas Seiko

Kellogg Kodak Matsushita

McDonald's Nivea Hitachi

Hershey Porsche Suntory

(4) For details of Chinese grammar, see the two influential grammar books by Chao, 1968 and Li & Thompson, 1981.

(5) For 9400 generally used morphemes, refer to The Dictionary of Generally-used Morphemes in Modern Chinese (1987) published by the Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press, Beijing, China. For 3500 frequently used morphemes, refer to The Dictionary of Frequently-used Morphemes in Modern Chinese (1989) published by San Qin Press, Xi-an, Shan-xi, China.

(6) See The Editing and Publishing Committee of The Best Products in China (1990) The Best Products in China 1979-1988. Beijing: Mechanical Industry Press. The book documents 4436 national award-winning products from 1979 to 1988.

(7) See The Information Centre of the Chinese Light Industry (1994) China Top Brands -- Consumer Goods. Beijing: Chemical Industry Press.

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