The Most Mispronounced Brands From Every Country

Kodak. Ikea. Sony. Some brand names are just easy to say! Others…not so much. Take Toca Boca (an online children’s game), for instance. “We wanted a name that was fun to say, easy to say, and that would work in many different countries,” said Toca Boca CEO Bjorn Jeffery. The name’s appeal can’t be denied, with the kids’ apps and games downloaded over 849 million times in 215 countries. The success of brands like Toca Boca and SpongeBob SquarePants underscores how the sonic qualities of a name can be as impactful as its meaning. To identify the most mispronounced brands globally, BusinessFinancing.co.uk analyzed data from Forvo.com, a pronunciation language app. The findings revealed that France’s Société Générale is the most mispronounced brand worldwide, while Tommy Hilfiger leads in the U.S., and Spotify tops the tech category (those don’t seem that hard to us, but the data doesn’t lie…) The study highlights that pronunciation challenges are common across various sectors, from fashion to technology, illustrating the global nature of branding challenges. Plus, the data is presented in gorgeous infographic form, so this is a lot more interesting than it may seem at face value!