According to David Burd, president of The Naming Company in East Stroudsburg, Pa., it’s common for new entrepreneurs to try to convey too much in their business names. “A name is not an ad campaign,” he says. “It allows you to write checks and do business. It’s not the end-all, be-all of marketing.”Instead, he says, your name should be memorable, simple and easy to pronounce. Start-ups should avoid long names such as Genevieve’s Fishing and Tackle Supplies, which are difficult in some media, he adds. “On the radio, she’d be saying, ‘that’s Genevieve, spelled, g-e-n-e-v-i-e-v-e-no apostrophe-s hyphen fishing hyphen tackle dot-com, let me repeat, that’s…’ ”
When conjuring up a name for a new company or product, Mr. Burd and his team consider four types: descriptive, suggestive, arbitrary and fanciful. A descriptive name says just what it is (Beaded Jewelry Inc.). A suggestive name applies a quality or attribute of your product (say, Indonesian Jewelry, if all your beads were from Indonesia). An arbitrary name has no connection to what you are selling, along the lines of, say, Apple Computer Inc. A fanciful name is a made-up word: Xerox Corp., or Accenture Ltd.
He suggests this simple exercise for devising a distinctive name. Start with the name of your favorite plant, your childhood pet, your street or other name. “It doesn’t matter,” he says, “as long as it distinguishes her from other beaded-jewelry makers.” Then use that word to modify your line of business. You might end up with “Marigold Beaded Jewelry,” “Lisa’s Beads” or “Spring Street Bead Designs.”
Are you contemplating an online business? Cutesy spelling can work for packaged products, he says, but are murder as an Internet domain name. No one can remember how to spell it to find the Web site.
tim Reid on December 30th, 2005 at 6:43 pm
Mmmmm….I beg to differ here. I think a business name is mighty important, particularly for start ups. It IS an ad and it is an integral part of the marketing equation. When budgets are modest and every little bit of ‘noise around your brand’ counts a great business name can go along way to encouraging people to do business with you.
For a start-up, I believe a descriptive business name is a must. It cuts staright to the chase and means people don’t have to work hard in figuring it out what it is you do and offer. The idea of a ‘made up’ name ie. Xerox should only be considered by companies that have the neceessary big marketing bucks to put behind getting it out there.
I’ve found the most successful naming startegies is to emply a method I devised which I call ‘Uncovering the Brand Essence’. It’s not ground breakingly new…What I’ve done is simply identify those key peices of information you need in order to understand the essence of a business.
Specifically, they are it’s CLAIM TO FAME (ie. what does the business physically do and what benefit does this offer the customer); CORE VALUES; PERSONALITY and PRIMARY DRIVER (ie. what is the major reason people need you?).
When you know and understand these key bits of the puzzle you are in a strong position to design / dvelop all components of the brand. Apply the same thinking to your own self…If you understand the esence of who you are then think how easy it becomes to make decisions about how you dress, where you go, what you do with your limited time and so on.
I have just completyed this exercise with a wardrobe franchise company. When they came to see me they were convinced that the best name for there new business would be Wardrobes 123…Scary, huh?! At the completion of uncovering their brand essence the resulting namew is OUT OF SIGHT Wardrobe Solutions. Why Out of Sight? Because the brand essence exercise uncovered the key fact that a new wardrobe meant more space and a tidier home. How? By providing a solution that ensured things were kept out of sight.
Naming is a fun and rewarding exercise for any business. It’s also an incredibly important part of the mix.
Cheers for now…
TIM The Ideas Guy
http://www.theideasguy.com.au
I-T on December 31st, 2005 at 3:23 am
I’ve been checking out your posts, and this is a really impressive blog you got going on around here. Never thought I could view business from this perspective. I’ve always envisioned business as some boring thing that I might have to someday during my elder years to ensure my very existence.
Anyways best of luck for you blog and keep posting.
/me is RSS’ing your blog this very instant.
Rebecca Thomas Designs » Blog Archive » Your business name should be… on December 31st, 2005 at 10:15 am
[...] When I started out on my own, I originally kept the name in the hopes of keeping some of her energy around when she moved on. It blew up in my face yet again. I thought long and hard about a new business name, first trying out Tapestry Designs based on a long-stnading daydream of mine. That similarly ran into problems because people found it a bit misleading. [...]
Business Opportunity on January 1st, 2006 at 10:40 pm
Hello:
This is a very important article because it teaches prospective business owners how to create a memorable business name that will make it easy to advertise their businesses and succeed faster.
When you have a business name that is easy to pronounce, easy to spell and easy to remember, it can act like a magnet that will draw lots of customers to you and quicken your success.
By the way, how do you like the name “Maychic”?
Ikey Benney, CEO
Maychic Worldwide Corporation
New York City
http://www.maychic.com
Startup Fever » Blog Archive » Four Ways to Name Your Business on January 2nd, 2006 at 4:00 am
[...] Dane Carlson points us to a StartupJournal article that offers some tips on naming a business: When conjuring up a name for a new company or product, Mr. Burd and his team consider four types: descriptive, suggestive, arbitrary and fanciful. A descriptive name says just what it is (Beaded Jewelry Inc.). A suggestive name applies a quality or attribute of your product (say, Indonesian Jewelry, if all your beads were from Indonesia). An arbitrary name has no connection to what you are selling, along the lines of, say, Apple Computer Inc. A fanciful name is a made-up word: Xerox Corp., or Accenture Ltd. [...]
Bright Shokare on February 15th, 2008 at 8:16 am
Sir, am having a problem creating my business name from my names. i have tried Brightmon but it has already been used, can you help.