Do you just hate the thought of hunkering down to painstakingly research companies for possible investment? Are you not interested in receiving stock and fund recommendations from trusted sources, instead wanting to dig up promising long-term investments on your own? Here's a new gambit for you: Study what new parents are naming their children.

According to an article in the Orlando Sentinel, more and more parents are naming their babies after products or even companies. That's right -- in 2000 there were at least five girls named Disney (NYSE:DIS), along with 12 Camrys and 5 Celicas, after the Toyota (NYSE:TM) vehicles. If that doesn't seem like much, consider the 571 Armanis (split roughly 50-50 between girls and boys) and 164 Nauticas (mainly girls). This appears to be a trend that's gaining steam, but it isn't an entirely new one. Think of the popular name that's based on a major jewelry purveyor: Tiffany (NYSE:TIF).

Why might an investor care? Well, if the world has more and more Nauticas (NASDAQ:NAUT) walking around in it, you can think of that as long-term advertising. Companies pay a lot of money just to put their name in front of consumers once or twice. Thanks to this product-and-company-name trend, homeroom teachers might be delivering daily commercials as they call out, "Evian Smith?" "Darvon Wilkinson?" As the kids grow up, more possibilities emerge. Imagine following your favorite athlete in the newspaper each day -- perhaps Canon (NYSE:CAJ) Esposito or Nokia (NYSE:NOK) Morimoto. With life expectancies spanning scores of years now, we'll have many long-term commercials walking around.

Of course, there's a little danger in this, too. If Courvoisier Wilson turns out to be a Very Bad Person (perhaps a serial killer or infomercial pitch person), the namesake product's image might find itself a bit tarnished.

One factor driving parents to choose these names is a desire to be different. If you're among them, here are names you might avoid, as you think of products and services that you love: According to the Social Security Administration, which is able to keep track of baby names when parents file for Social Security numbers, the top girl names in 2003 were Emily, Emma, Madison, Hannah, Olivia, Abigail, Alexis, Ashley, Elizabeth, and Samantha. The top boys' names were Jacob, Michael, Joshua, Matthew, Andrew, Joseph, Ethan, Daniel, Christopher, and Anthony. The list doesn't change too quickly, as Emily has held the top position since 1996 and Jacob since 1999.

Do you have any ideas for some cool names for babies based on companies or products? Share them with fellow Fools on our discussion board -- we're offering a free trial of our entire vast discussion board community right now.

Longtime Fool contributor Selena Maranjian does not own shares of any companies mentioned in this article.