> I remember a company saying its most effective ads were search ads for their own name

I don't have the full context, but this is almost a tautology. Of course you get the highest click-through-rate and highest conversion for searches that are your own name. You usually also get a relatively cheap bid, because most search engines prefer to prioritize relevant results, and you will be very relevant for your own name. But you would have gotten most of those clicks and conversion _for free_ even if you didn't advertise on your name, because the searcher would see your organic result. Advertising on your own name is defensive, not offensive -- you protect customers that are already yours, you don't get new ones.

source: I run marketing for a small business, we advertise on our own name too, and of course it is also the most effective if you calculate it naively.