Building Sollos: Naming & Identity

There’s one job I dread every time we build a product: naming.

Not because it isn’t important, but because it’s too important and completely subjective. Everyone has an opinion. Research can help narrow the field, but it rarely settles anything.

My go-to anecdote is The Beatles. For years, I assumed the name came from an insect. I completely missed the wordplay. Beat. Rhythm. Music. But that’s the point. A name only becomes meaningful after you build something worth remembering. Choose a name, commit to it, and over time the work gives it meaning.

The process behind what eventually became Sollos was exactly the kind of chaos I try to avoid.

We went through hundreds of options. Some were too generic. Others leaned too far into wellness clichés. Many were already taken. Others were blocked by domain squatters or trademark conflicts. Even when names were technically available, the practical reality made them unusable.

We explored workarounds. Prefixes, suffixes, creative spellings. All of them diluted the idea.

At one point, a working name emerged that nobody loved but nobody hated. It felt safe, which was precisely the problem. Then, almost accidentally, the word “oscillate” started appearing in early stimulus decks. Not as a name, just as a reference point. It described what the product actually did. Rhythm. Movement. Structure.

That led to Oscil8. Reactions were mixed. Some people liked it immediately. Others stumbled over pronunciation or worried about how it would land internationally. It felt slightly niche and slightly technical, but we committed to it because it captured the essence of the idea at the time.

Later, during a leadership transition, a new option surfaced: Sollos.

It landed instantly. It felt simpler, warmer, and more open. Crucially, it was ownable. By then, the product and thinking had matured enough to support a name that didn’t need explanation.

Naming rarely follows a straight line. It’s usually a series of compromises until something feels right enough to carry forward. The important thing is knowing when to stop searching and start building meaning around what you’ve chosen.