If you are just starting a new project or business choosing your business name is a very important task, that will probably keep you awake at night. So, here are my top tips on how to choose your business name.
If you think about your business as a three legged stool, then skills are one leg and finances and marketing are the other two. If one leg is shorter than the others – your business – like the stool – might be in danger of collapsing and falling over. So, branding is a part of marketing and choosing your logo and business name is a very important part of establishing your business.
If you are choosing a name from scratch think about the following practical checklist:
Do your research
No matter how original you think your name is, the chances are that somebody else has already thought of it. When I was choosing a name for my first business, I woke up in the middle of the night and thought of ‘Cinnamon Rose’. I loved it and wanted it, until I ‘Googled’ it and found that others had thought about it first. If your name is already taken, have a look where the business is based and what they do. Sometimes if the business is in completely different field and your domain is available, you might be fine to go ahead. In my case, ‘Cinnamon Rose’ was a beautiful florist shop somewhere in north England, but I still felt I wanted to have ‘my own name’.
Know your market
You need to know who are your potential customers. If your customers are trendy fashion conscious people, then an old-fashioned name will not bring them in (unless it’s ultra cool and vintage…).
Keep it simple
Don’t try to be too clever – if you need to explain to your customers what your name means and how to spell it, then the chances are that they will not remember you. From a practical point of view, if your name becomes a web domain and people won’t be able to type it in correctly, you might lose your customers before they even get to you.
Keep it short
Your name needs to be memorable and should have a strong visual image behind it. If your name is awkward and long people will not remember it. If they can’t immediately picture something behind your name, your name will not stay in their memories.
Make it a positive name
I don’t think that many people would do this, but it is a good idea to bear in mind that positive images (and names) work better than negative or offensive names, that will deter people immediately.
Finalise your choice
write all your choices down and ask for an opinion. You can try your friends and family, but I would really recommend asking people who don’t know you. They are likely to be more honest. Keep the list of all names somewhere visible (on the fridge door) and just leave it for couple of days. Keep looking at the list, but don’t think too much about choosing one name. One day, the right name will just jump out from the page and you will know.
There is nothing wrong in using your own name as your brand – in fact most designers do this and if you are successful, people will start recognising your name as the ‘brand’ (think Laura Ashley or Cath Kidson). But, until you get there the brand of ‘Maureen Table’ will not mean anything to others. That is why some people choose a name that symbolises and describes what they do.
On the other hand, if you use your own name, you have the option to switch between different businesses without worrying too much about the name. It will be still you, just doing different things. When I was choosing name for my coaching business it felt right just to use my name. I’m not a large management company, it’s just me (for the moment…) so there was no point spending time and effort working on a business name. From practical point of view, if your name is available as a domain I would recommend to buy it anyway. You never know where business will take you and at least nobody else can have it and use it.
Also think about the name from a business point of view – if your name is ‘Maureen’s Handmade Cards’ and you decide to add other product lines and expand your business, by sewing cushion covers, people might be quite confused about the name and you will need to keep explaining that you ‘also do cushion covers’. So, think about a name that could be used for not just now, but also in the future – e.g. ‘Maureen’s Handmade’.
Another good reason for choosing your business name carefully, is to check whether that name is available as a website, e-mail, Twitter or Facebook domain. This will be important if you decide to have a website or blog in the future. There are any number of domain providers (such as Reg 123) where you simply key in your chosen name to check if it’s available. The yearly fee is anything from £2.99 to £14.99 (or more). It is worth securing your domain early on, so that nobody else can take it later. There are number of endings to each website e.g. co.uk, com, biz etc., so if you want to make sure that nobody uses the same name (but just with a different ending) buy all the domains you can afford, but at least uk & com (if you are UK based).
Your business name can either be descriptive, so it is obvious what you do or you could think of a name that will evoke the ‘feeling’ about your products and the feeling that you want to evoke in your customer (e.g. Bespoke Vintage, Rose Vintage). You might also like to leave a bit unraveled, so that the customer is interested about the name and will want to know more (‘Through the looking glass…’).
Finally, you have to be comfortable with the name you choose. You will be the one, who will promote it and say it a million times to your potential customers, so it has to be something you have a strong connection with.
In my own experience, it took me a few months to come up with a name and it was not for lack of choice ! My well meaning friends and husband suggested names, which I politely, but firmly refused. There was ‘The Midas Touch’. When you pronounce ‘Midas’ it sounds like my family name in Czech, but nobody would get this, would they ? Also, I do not work with gold, so why chose this name ?! My own first suggestion was: ‘Magdalena’. Well that is simple enough, it is my name after all and everything I do (which is quite a lot of different things) is linked back to me. Yes, a good choice, I hear you say, but then I saw that the cheapest web domain was 10 k (!!!) to buy and it was not even .co.uk…
My otherwise lovely husband suggested ‘Sweet Touch’ on the basis that everything I bake is sweet and lovely, but I felt it sound it more like a massage parlour. I have already mentioned Cinnamon & Rose (or Cinnamon Rose), which I loved, but loads of people already had that, when I googled it.
Choosing your business name is exciting, it means that your business properly exists and you start creating your own piece of business world.
Oh, by the way, the name I chose in the end, came to me in the middle of the night and it was just perfect. I make chocolate, but also bake and sew and most of my designs are in a shape of a heart. My favourite perfume is Coco Mademoiselle and all my things are made from my heart. So, that is how my first business name ‘Cocoa & Heart’ was born.
I love to know your story behind your name, so feel free to leave me a comment!
Magdalena
