Twitter isn’t the primary firm to vary names. How’d it work out for a few of these different companies?

You’ve absolutely heard the information {that a} sure big, well-established Web firm is altering its title. That’s proper, Overstock.com is formally changing into BedBathandBeyond.com!

What? You thought I used to be referring to Elon Musk altering Twitter.com to X? I suppose that’s massive information, too, however I’m extra thinking about Overstock.com’s resolution as a result of the individuals working Overstock have a significantly better sense concerning the potential penalties of a poorly executed title change. In any case, when you may not bear in mind this about Overstock, they usually most likely hope you’ve forgotten, the corporate already tried altering its title as soon as. In reality, in 2011, greater than a decade earlier than Elon Musk’s present try to modify from “Twitter” to “X”, Overstock’s then-management workforce determined their web site would henceforth be referred to as O.co.

How’d Overstock’s change to a one-letter title exercise? Not so nice…

The corporate spent a whole lot of thousands and thousands of {dollars} on the whole lot from TV commercials to renaming the Oakland Coliseum the O.co Coliseum. However your entire plan embarrassingly blew up of their faces. Customers didn’t perceive that “.co” was a legitimate area title, in order that they stored typing in “O.com,” and, consequently, Overstock’s web site was dropping thousands and thousands of holiday makers.

Whoops!

Whereas the swap to a single-letter naming scheme is a enjoyable coincidence between the tales of Overstock and Twitter, the extra essential similarity is the purported motive the 2 firms modified their names.

Within the case of Overstock, firm leaders felt like an “overstock” model was inhibiting their skill to broaden into different industrial markets with greater revenue margins (e.g. luxurious items, high-end vogue, state-of-the-art electronics, etcetera). They’d hassle securing items from firms who didn’t need their merchandise branded as “overstock,” and shoppers weren’t all the time thinking about shopping for dearer items in the event that they appeared like producer surplus.