Find the right business name with creativity and research.
You have the business idea, you have passion and drive, and before you start working on your marketing plan, you need to work on choosing your business name.
A business name should represent your brand, be memorable, industry relevant, and untrademarked. You also might want to do some research for SEO purposes.
The process can vary, but here are 5 ways to come up with a creative name for your new business.
- Use the Thesaurus. There are so many great names that are already trademarked and/or taken. Fuel your creativity with the perfect synonym of what you’re trying to represent.
- Draw inspiration from your location. Keep it local and research the flowers, trees, pollinators, rivers, mountains or founders of your area. Granted, others have thought of this, but it never hurts to dig deeper to find something original.
- Change the spelling. You can try to drop a letter, add an extra letter, or replace a letter. As an example there is a new startup called Jobot. There are a few established companies Tumblr or Fiverr for example and a pop star known as The Weeknd.
- Replace letters with symbols. Some examples are YUM! or YAHOO! using an exclamation in their branded name. SK-II uses roman numerals, Strategy& created a new name out of a known industry term. Ke$ha adopted the dollar sign as an S in her name.
- Make up a word. You can mash two words together like Groupon did with group and coupon, or put a spin on a descriptive like Tourish did with their tourist agency. Find some inspiration with Snoop Dog fo shizzle my nizzle. Peter Klavin from I Love You, Man had some classic nonsense with “laters on the menjay,” “Totes ma goats,” and Slappa-da-bayyse! Have fun with it, get goofy.
Register your business name
After you’ve come up with the perfect name, you’ll need to register it to protect it. Below is a list of how it works:
- Entity name protects you at a state level
- Trademark protects you at a federal level
- Doing business as (DBA) doesn’t give legal protection, but it might be legally required
- Domain name protects your business website address
(SOURCE: SBA)
The good news?
Honey + Hare can help you with creative names to help in the process of Choosing Your Business Name
Of course Honey + Hare is here to help if you’ve tried and need some extra creativity to find the perfect name. Naming is part of our full branding package.
Send us a quick email and we’ll get back to you ASAP!
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