As we're growing Tampa Devs, we're spinning off multiple subbrands. Job boards, news feeds, hackathons, etc are just some of the tools we're building internally

With new brands comes ways of checking if a brand name will be memorable to it's members

Before working on any visual designs for brand (see how we made Tampa Devs logo here), we usually look at the name itself. And we speak it aloud and read it on a piece of paper to see what it looks like. Here's how to explain Tampa Devs phonetically:

• [Tam_pa]-[Devs]-[Dot]-[Com] - 5 syllables for the domain
• [Tam_pa]-[Devs] - 3 syllables for the brand

Less syllables are always better for remembering a brand.

Also how common these words are important too. If you told someone the word "Tampa" while they live or reside in "Tampa", they probably won't say something like "Did you mean XYZ word instead?"

"Devs" for us is sometimes misspelled since this is slang for Developers, but this is intentional since "Developers" is also used for people in real estate

Here's another example with my personal domain name, vincentntang

Here's how I'd explain it phonetically

Hey my name is Vincent Tang

My website is
my first name, the letter n for nancy, 
and my lastname, [dot] com

so
[vin_cent]-[N]-[tang]-[dot]-[com]

This is a total of 6 syllables, granted my name is fairly short too. My email is also using vincentntang as well, so it follows the same rules

Even then sometimes my name is misinterpreted, so I'm going with my own custom link shortener, vta.ng (it's a nigerian top level domain).

So now I can also explain it using NATO, the standard for military radio communication.

Here's an example of how I'd use it:

You can navigate to vta.ng/30 to schedule a meeting with me

so this is at
[v] as in victor, [t] as in tom, [a] as in apple, [dot], 
[n] as in nancy, [g] as in good. Then add "30" like the number

so it's
[V]-[T]-[A]-[Dot]-[N]-[G]-[dash]-[thir_ty]

like my first letter of my first name, 
and my lastname with a dot inbetween

In the above example, I explain 3 different ways the URL over the phone

Here's how to explain AirBnB for instance to your grandma/grandpa or someone who's never heard of it

airbnb.com

[air] as in the word air, [B n B] for bed and breakfast
[dot]-[com]

The more ways you explain it, the less someone will misspell it.

Explaining things phonetically is also how advertising travels by word-of-mouth too. Having a short easy to remember name goes along way

TLDR - Explain your brand phonetically. If you can explain it over the phone multiple ways in a short time frame over a phone call, it's most likely a memorable brand name