When naming a business, most first-time founders want a name to pop up and grab them. They want the fairytale: love at first sight. But naming doesn’t work like that — it’s more like ‘real love’ than ‘fairytale love.’ 

Sure, you might get butterflies from catching someone’s eye across the room. But in the end, that person is unlikely to end up being perfect for you. In order to find real love, you need to get to know someone. Sometimes, the butterflies come later!

Just like dating, when trying to name your brand, the right thing isn’t to grab the first name that catches your eye but to build a list of several names that fit your business, and then take the time to make sure they not only embody the vision of your brand’s future but that they’d also be a great long term fit. 

There’s a lot of giving and taking. No person is perfect, and likewise, no name is perfect. The path to a happy marriage is paved with hard work, the same way you’ll end up with a great brand if you’re willing to go through the right steps. 

From our experience handling over 30,000 naming projects, falling in love with your brand name without thinking about how it relates to your brand’s story, getting feedback from real people, and speaking with a trademark attorney is a big mistake!

But What’s Wrong with Falling in Love with Your Brand’s Name?

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Any entrepreneur searching for the best name for their business must resist the urge to look at a list of six, twenty-five, or even two thousand names and just pick one at random without ensuring it aligns with their business. 

Making hasty decisions and choosing names like that comes with a lot of problems because some of these names are usually:

1. Difficult to Trademark

One thing we see with entrepreneurs who pick names they’ve fallen in love with is that they don’t simply ignore checking if the name is in tune with their naming criteria; they also skip testing the name with an audience, and ignore every red flag until they enter the trademarking process.

And while trying to trademark the name, they finally discover that they can’t use it because another company has already taken the name.

It’s at this point that the problem begins because now that you’ve seen all these names and invested all your passion in a name you love—but it got rejected—it becomes difficult to find another name to replace it.

And getting a name trademarked is a lot harder because businesses like WordPress and Shopify churn out millions of businesses, making it super difficult to find a business name that another brand hasn’t taken.

Now, unlike in the 70s and 80s, where it was difficult to build a website and almost impossible to launch an e-commerce site in ten days, today it’s a lot easier. But despite the many positives of these simple, fast tools for starting a business — this ease has made naming even more challenging. 

2. Unaligned with the Entrepreneur’s Business and Customers 

Most times, entrepreneurs are in a hurry to choose a name they love as their brand name because they like it, it makes sense and resonates with them deeply, but when the name is put to the test, they discover a shocking truth; it doesn’t align with their business and customers.

Picking one name without considering every aspect of your brand can be dangerous to the survival of your business. So, the solution to avoiding these dangers lies in not choosing only one name but in choosing several names, and here’s how you can go about that. 

How Entrepreneurs Can Find Great Names for Their Businesses

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It’s very easy for entrepreneurs to get discouraged when a name they love fails, but here are some quick tips that can help you avoid this situation altogether. 

Set Up Your Naming and Branding Criteria 

Understand that every brand’s name should do three major things. They should be easy to say, easy to spell, and also easy to remember. These are the fundamental principles that every name must abide by.

But don’t just stop with making sure your name aligns with your naming criteria and the fundamental principles; also, make sure it has a link to your brand. 

Let’s say you want to start a modern business; then, your name should have a modern feel. If you want a high-end company, then your name should have a high-end feel. This simple strategy would set you on the path to creating a name that’d be a valuable asset to your brand.

So, while generating your brand’s name, your goal isn’t to say, “That one! I want that one!” Instead, it’s to say, “Here’s a list of four, fifteen names. I can say them, spell them, remember them; they fit my brand directionally, and somewhere in there, is the perfect name that fits my criteria.”

Doing this would make it a lot easier to walk through the next phase of gathering your team, looking through the list, and working together to decide which name is the best one for your brand.

Your team should cut down the entries, and when you have these select names, proceed with the next step.

Test Your Names with an Audience

Now it’s time to engage your audience and say, “Okay, audience, which one of these do you think is the best fit for our company? Which name is going to get you the most excited about learning more about our company?”

It doesn’t matter if your brand is targeting the global market, by engaging with your audience, you’d be able to get a first-hand reaction that’d not only tell you if customers love your name but also point you in the right direction to finding one they can engage with. 

And when it comes to building audience engagements, one quick way to do that is to find names that are easy to say, spell, and also tell your brand’s story. Some great examples of highly engaging names are Apple, Burt’s Bees, Tesla, and Hulu. 

Trademark Your Name

In this world where everything is immediate, and Amazon would deliver you almost anything within two days, it’s difficult to accept that trademarking a name isn’t an easy task.

Trademarking is a massive process that hasn’t only frustrated but stopped lots of entrepreneurs in their tracks. There’s nothing more frustrating than saying, “This is the one name I must use! My team is behind it; it has to be this,” only for the name to be rejected by the trademark attorney.

And it doesn’t matter how madly in love you were with that name or how desperately you wanted to tattoo it across your back; you just have to let it go, because it’d bring a whole lot of legal damages that might destroy your brand.

So how do you move through the trademarking process? The key to trademarking a name for your brand lies in sharing several names with your trademarking attorney, not just one, but between three to nine names or more. This way, you’d end up with a couple of names that’d make it through the process.

Like we said earlier, one peculiar thing about trademarking is the fact that it’s getting tougher to trademark a name even as other things are getting easier and customers are embracing the “I like it, I want it, give it to me” culture. 

That’s why everyone must do their due diligence to avoid a name that’d make their business susceptible to a cease and desist letter.

Follow the Process: Know the Do’s and Don’ts

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Like we said earlier, when trying to find the best name for your business, don’t just pick one name, decide that’s the one, shove it down everyone’s throat, and move forward with it without caring about trademarks.

Instead, get your team involved, set up your branding and naming criteria, and search for some strong names that align with these criteria. And a great place to start your search is with a powerful business name generator. 

The next thing after finding some strong names that are in tune with your criteria is to get your team members behind the perfect name. It’s typically not a great idea to choose a name that a good number of your team members don’t support. 

But while trying to get your team members behind a name, make sure their decision to back a name is based on the branding and naming criteria you’d established earlier. And one more thing, make sure that whatever brand name you choose has a .com or other professional domain; otherwise, your business would struggle to establish its presence online.  

In the end, the general naming process is simple:

• Set up your criteria
• Find names that align with these criteria 
• Get buy-in from your team (if you have one) 
• Test the names with an audience test
• Proceed with trademark research
• Make your final decision
• Get your name trademarked and start branding your venture

Carefully following these simple steps will help you avoid the dangers that come with choosing one name without considering its implications on your brand.