I have enjoyed the fact that Alfred doesn't crash, but it seems much worse at interpreting abbreviations. For example, with no training QuickSilver took me to TextMate by typing "tm," where Alfred still has trouble with this. I also considered LaunchBar. It looks very nice, but I cannot justify the price for my use given the alternatives.
1. Turn on fuzzy matching in the preferences under Applications (with or without anchoring, as you prefer)
2. Create a Spotlight Comment if you want to call it something completely different (e.g. label all your browsers with the keyword "browser" to launch them all at once) More on Spotlight comments here: http://help.alfredapp.com/features/applications/
