@Dave: There actually is a problem with the code. I've modified the code below and the output. As you can see it lists the names twice instead of just once. That's why I wanted to match the data exactly using the specific field in the file.

#!/usr/bin/env perl

use strict;
use warnings;

my %count;

my $namecnt='David|Tom|Sam|Will|Dave|William|Thomas';

while(<DATA>){

    my @words = split(":");

    foreach my $word (@words){
        if($word=~/($namecnt)/io){
            $count{$1}++;
        }
    }
}

foreach my $word (sort keys %count) {
    printf("(STDOUT) %39s  %-14s  %-19s  %6s", "There are", $count{$wo
+rd}, $word, "Name(s)\n");
    print "(OUTPUT) There are $count{$word} $word Name(s)\n";
}

__DATA__
1:NAME:Bob:Bobville:Phone
2:NAME:Dave:Davis:Phone
3:NAME:Will:Willard:Phone
4:NAME:Todd:Toadlane:Phone
[download]

(STDOUT) There are 1 Dave Name(s)
(OUTPUT) There are 1 Dave Name(s)
(STDOUT) There are 2 Will Name(s)
(OUTPUT) There are 2 Will Name(s)