Source: https://thumbor.forbes.com/
Starting a business comes with a lot of challenges. You will have many things to organize and plan, and you may have to hire staff, or source products to sell, or find business premises.
One factor that many entrepreneurs fail to spend enough time considering is the name of their business. The name of your company can influence the success or failure of your business, and the wrong name will fail to connect with potential customers and could even lead to legal problems. The right name can make marketing and advertising easy, and your company’s brand will spread through word of mouth.
Here are a few tips that can help anyone avoid choosing the wrong name for their business and brand, and find a name that works for them.
Don’t Choose a Name That Limits Your Business’s Growth
Sometimes when naming a business, people can give their company a name that limits their growth going forward.
An example of this would be if the company Amazon had been called ‘Book World’. When the company first began by selling books online, this would have been fine, but as the company grew in size and stature it began to sell more than just books and became one of the world’s biggest online retailers. If it had been called ‘Book World’ then the company would need to be rebranded if it wanted to sell more than just books, wasting the reputation and recognition it had built in its early days.
Avoid Anything Hard to Spell or Easy to Mispronounce
You don’t want to choose a name that is hard to spell or pronounce, especially in the age of the internet. Your name needs to be easily searched online, and if you want word of mouth to spread, you need customers to be easily able to say it to friends and family.
You want a name that conveys some meaning and also some intrigue. Having a name that soon becomes ubiquitous with the service or products you offer is the goal here. Think of the name Google. It is an odd word that wasn’t used much in everyday language, but has now become a verb meaning to search on the internet. This is one of the best examples of branding in modern times.
Search Thoroughly Online for Companies with the Same Name or Similar
When you have chosen a name for your business or brand, it is recommended you search thoroughly online to see if there is already a company trading under that name.
A simple web search often isn’t enough, as some business don’t have a strong web presence but still have trademarks and copyrights. There are websites that offer an LLC name search across each individual state that can help prevent you from using the name of an existing business.
Building a business can be incredibly rewarding, but if you choose the wrong name you will never gain the momentum you need to grow. Worse still, if you use a name that an existing company uses, you may find yourself having to change your brand after you have already done a lot of hard work and spent a lot of money on advertising and signage.
