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Whether it’s on our food, clothes, or car, we encounter various brands every single day. And aside from logos, one of the key aspects that distinguishes a brand is their name, with some brand names being more recognisable and easier to spell than others.

Interested in brand recognition, the business finance team at money.co.uk, used online analytics tool Ahrefs to find some of the most misspelled brand names on the internet.

The Results:

Money.co.uk found that popular South Korean automotive manufacturer Hyundai is one of the most misspelled brands on the internet, with an average of 605,000 incorrect global online searches per month. Common search variations for Hyundai include ‘Hundai’ (581,000 monthly searches) and ‘Hiundai’ (24,000 monthly searches).

In second place is Lamborghini, with an average of 365,000 inaccurate online searches a month for the luxury sports car giant. Those searching for Lamborghini, are typically misspelling it as ‘Lamborgini’ (351,000 monthly searches) and ‘Lambogini’ (14,000 monthly searches).

Ferrari is in third position. The misspelled ‘Ferari’ is searched online an average 123,000 times a month.

French cognac producer Hennessy (‘Henessy’, ‘Hennesy’, ‘Henesy’ – 95,100 combined) and Dutch beer producer Heineken (‘Heinken’ – 90,000), respectively rank fourth and fifth.

Interestingly, Uniqlo in ninth spot is the most misspelled clothing retailer on the list. The company which originated from Japan is erroneously searched online an average 58,600 times every month. The error-filled Uniqlo searches include ‘Uniclo’ (55,000 monthly searches), ‘Unilo’ (2,100 monthly searches) and ‘Uniql’ (1,500 monthly searches).

At the other end of the rankings, in 20th position is Porsche. The German high-performance automotive manufacturer is incorrectly searched online an average 19,500 times per month, the biggest alternatives being ‘Porsh’ (10,000 monthly searches) and ‘Porsch’ (9,500 online searches).

Overall, seven out of the 20 most misspelled brands on the internet are from the automotive industry.

Salman Haqqi, a business finance editor from money.co.uk, offered guidance on what to consider when choosing a memorable brand name: “A brand name can be one of the core pillars that will determine the popularity and success of a business, therefore aspiring entrepreneurs must give careful consideration when choosing a brand name for their new business. There are some fundamentals they need to keep in mind when doing so:

• Unique – A brand name that is distinctive and makes the business stand out against competitors.
• Digestible – A brand name that is not too difficult to say or spell. In the e-commerce age, this is especially important, ideally a brand name people can easily Google and find online.
• Due diligence – A brand name that can be trademarked and you can acquire a web domain for.
• Visual awareness – A brand name that can be clearly communicated through colours, icons and logos.
• Longevity – Can the brand name grow in correlation with the business and maintain relevancy as the business expands into new products, services, markets and territories?”

Methodology:

1. Money.co.uk used online sources ‘Forbes’, ‘LoveMoney’ and ‘YouGov’ to create a comprehensive list of the biggest brands in the world from a range of sectors. 
2. Money.co.uk then inserted each brand name from the list into the Ahrefs keyword explorer tool to see if and where the given brand name is misspelled when internet users search for it online – by entering a given brand name into the Ahrefs keyword explorer tool, it showcased all the terms being searched in relation to the brand name and from there the misspelled searches (and how many times per month on average they were being searched online) for a given brand name were identified.
3. Only brands where one or more variations of their name was commonly misspelled online were recorded by money.co.uk.
4. Once data was collated for all the brands, they were ranked from highest to lowest based on the average number of times per month they were spelled wrong.
5. The top 20 results were presented in the final results table.
6. All online search volumes extracted from Ahrefs are monthly averages and represent global online searches.
7. All data was collected on Friday 29th October 2021 and is correct as of then, but is subject to change.