Naming your business can be a challenge. The name you choose helps create your brand, it lays the foundation for your business, and hopefully lasts for the foreseeable future. When I was creating my first e-commerce store, it took me weeks to come up with a name. I finally got to a point where I couldn’t proceed further with my business as I needed to legalize it, and of course, I needed a name in order to do so.

During that time, I read pages upon pages of advice and tips for naming your business and learned quite a bit along the way. Hopefully with the tips for naming your business that I’ve compiled from my own experience, you will find simplicity and assistance in naming your business.

There are two components to naming your business. The first is choosing a name. The second, which isn’t as commonly discussed, is making sure your name is available. I can’t tell you how many great names I found where after further digging, I realized they were not available in some way or another.

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TIPS FOR NAMING YOUR BUSINESS – THINGS TO CONSIDER 

1)     DO YOU WANT YOUR NAME TO TELL MORE ABOUT WHAT YOU DO?

For example, if I had a company that I named “Jaclyn” (my first name) you would have no idea what I sold or what service I provide, unless I provided further context. Now say I was a photographer, and I named my company “Photography by Jaclyn” with the additional words, you now have an idea as to what my company is about. Now don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of very well-known brand names that don’t give a clue as to what the company is about. (I can think of a few popular shoe brands that fall within this category.) You will need to decide if you want your name to be a foreshadow as to what you do, or if your products can stand on their own without the assistance of further context in your name.

2)     DON’T CHOOSE A NAME THAT LIMITS YOU.

As you are starting a new business, you may have an idea as to your initial services or products, but you may want to expand in the future. Say you are starting a new business selling wooden signs. If you were to name your business something like “Jaclyn’s Wooden Signs” you are limiting yourself in the future to just selling wooden signs. In the future if you want to expand to other household décor, your name no longer would fit your business. While we can’t predict the future, try to give thought to the direction you want to go and choose a name that you can grow with.

3)     AVOID NAMES THAT MAY BE COMMONLY MISSPELLED.

4)     KEEP IT SHORT AND CONCISE.

Not only will it be easier for someone to remember, but when it comes time to legalize your company, there may be limits on the number of characters that fit in places like your credit card or forms for filing. If you are filing for a LLC, you will often need to use the letters “LLC” in your legal forms, so leave room for the extra characters. (Don’t make the mistake I made with a credit card that only says L instead of LLC.)

5)     USE RESOURCES TO HELP YOU.

1. Ask others for help
2. Use a thesaurus to suggest alternative words similar to your idea/product/service.
3. Use a business name generator. (I haven’t done this myself, so I don’t want to promote one generator over another, however a quick internet search will give you plenty of options to select from.)
4. Run a long-tail keyword search to see how frequently a keyword is searched for and other commonly used keywords. (Long-tail keywords can be a whole post in itself so I’m not going into extreme detail here.) I frequently use LongTailPro (they offer a free 7-day trial) to run my searches. These searches can provide information on how frequently the keyword is searched for, other common keywords, the relative amount of competition associated with the keyword, how much you may pay for marketing for that keyword, and much more.

TIPS FOR NAMING YOUR BUSINESS – CHECKING TO SEE IF YOUR NAME IS AVAILABLE

1)     Check to see if the domain is available. There are various places you can check this. I personally like GoDaddy to run a simple search to see if your site is available.

2)     Search the Trademark Electronic Search System (TESS) to see if there is already a trademark prohibiting you from using the name you’ve selected.

3)     Search popular social media sites to see if your name is available. (Even if you don’t plan on using social media for your business, you should perform this search and in my opinion, reserve your name in case you change your mind in the future.) Common sites to check include: Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Etsy, and Twitter.

4)     Check your local state’s LLC database to confirm the name is not already in use. Each site has a different website, so you will need to do a search to find your specific state’s database. You can type into a web search “Starting a business in <enter your state here>” or other common search to find more information.

5)     Run a web search on your proposed name. See what comes up in the search results. When I was brainstorming for a name for my business, one name I was interested in brought back search results on a horrific crime that had occurred. That name was quickly crossed off my list as I wouldn’t want future customers to search for my company and have to sort through negative news articles to find it.

Once you have found a name and confirmed its available, now it’s time to reserve your domain, social media sites and get to action!

Do you have any other tips for naming your business? Please share in the comments!