In a crowded market for exchange-traded funds, some industry heavyweights employ clever marketing to make their products stand out. BlackRock's iShares is a Cirque du Soleil sponsor, while State Street Global Advisors uses a professional golfer known as Spiderman as a pitchman for its SPDR funds.

But for most companies, the way to make an impression is to come up with attention-grabbing ticker symbols. A symbol can stand out for being literal (SOIL, Global X Fertilizers/Potash), figurative (DUST, Direxion Daily Gold Miners Bear 3X) or just plain alluring (GGGG, Global X Pure Gold Miners).