Sally Tomkotowicz shares her advice on choosing a company name that will set you up for great online business success.
It?s been playing on your brain all day. One of the biggest decisions you?ll make as an entrepreneur. And it?s 3am. You can?t get to sleep. You have to make a key decision that will shape your business every single day, influencing your online strategy or perhaps your sign on the high street, or the branding on the side of your car.
Yes, very quickly,?you?ve got to come up with your company name ? and it?s a hard process.
Naming your business is one of the most important steps any new entrepreneur has to take. Suddenly your idea on the back of a napkin or perhaps typed into your laptop becomes a reality.?Once you?ve thought of a good name you or your accountants or solicitors will register the name at Companies House for you and, in a very legal sense, that name will become the identity of your business for years to come.
Even the biggest, most creative, companies struggled with thinking up their company name at first.
Famously Steve Jobs asked everyone in the company if they could come up with a better name than Apple Computers over the weekend. No-one could, so the name stuck and was registered.
However the company overlooked the conflict with The Beatle?s famous Apple Records. Down the track as Apple moved into music with iTunes this decision led to a lengthy court case with The Beatles over the use of the Apple name, resulting in over $500m in speculated costs for Apple, Inc.
Thinking up a company name is really not as easy as it first appears and making sure it is searchable on Google and eligible for trademark makes this process even harder, however there are a few tips that I think will help make this decision a little easier.
?1.? Think about your target market
Have a good think about the type of customers you want to target.? These are very different for each business - from a plumber to a solicitor. Consumers have different expectations for an online retailer than a high street store. What type of customer do you want to attract? Do you want a highly fashionable and savvy customer? If so you may want a name that is very ?now? and reflects that audience ? while being mindful that your company name will last for a long time.
?2.?? Have your name reflect what it is you do
Some of the best company names are connected to what that company actually does. Coca-Cola describes the exact elements in their product and most people would assume that Match.com is a dating service, without having seen any advertising around the company. So the more your name communicates to consumers about your business, the less effort you must exert to explain it.
If you want to stand out in a crowded market you can take a more surreal name such as Apple, Egg and Orange, but you may have to invest a lot in marketing spend for people to associate you with the industry you work in.
3.? Do you want to brand yourself?
While it is less fashionable these days to name your company after yourself, this still works well for some businesses, especially those that follow strong personal leadership like Dyson, Disney and Ogilvy. The warning is that if the business ever sells, or the founder dies, these businesses can be perceived as losing their direction and worth. Even Disney pictures struggled at the box office for a decade after Walt Disney?s death.
?4.? Keep it short and simple
It is definitely a 21st century phenomena for names to be short and sweet. With the rise in importance of having a short email address, it is no wonder that companies spend huge amounts of money rebranding themselves with shorter names. Norwich Union is now Aviva, National Westminister Bank is Natwest and even Facebook has registered www.fb.com to make life easier.
5.? Owning your online name considerations
In reality your name at Companies House can be one of much permeation. You can own Worcester Plumbers Today Ltd. or Worcester Plumbers 24 Hours Ltd. But you can still ?brand? your company as Worcester Plumbers. It doesn?t matter for filing your books, where as owning your domain name will shape every email you send and every visitor to your website.
So once you?ve built a list of names using the above guidelines you can very quickly refine that list by checking which relevant domain names are available online, crossing off the names that are already taken.? You don?t want people to mistype your website address and land on your competitor?s site, so try to avoid using a similar address to your competitors.
You can search for your potential name using domain name search tools, a quick Google search for ?domain names search tools? will bring up lots of options for you to try. It is also worth checking the availability of the appropriate twitter handles, facebook and other relevant social channels too at this point.
6. Test Your Name
After you've narrowed your list you need to do some human testing.? Asking friends, family members (although these can be more biased) which ones they prefer.
7.? Trademark
?? Once you have complete your human testing phase you should have about 5 names to choose from at this point. It is worth you considering hiring a trademark attorney or at least a trademark search firm before you officially register your name to make sure your new name doesn't infringe on another business's trademark.
8.?? Registering online names
A fifth of small businesses admit they have lost out on registering their natural, first choice company name online and had to make do with second best because they failed to check availability and register their domain at the same time as setting up their business at companies house, don?t let this happen to you, try to register your domain, twitter and other social identities as quickly as possible.
There are a few things to consider when registering a domain name
- Be defensive ? purchase multiple versions of your website address, and consider purchasing misspellings of it too.
- Protect- Register your website addresses for as long as possible, you can register domains for up to 10 years.
- Extensions- The nature of your business will affect this. If you are a national company in the UK a co.uk would be ideal for your target audience, whereas an international company would ideally require a .com extension. If you have a blog, you could consider a .me.
There are naming experts out there that you can enlist to help you pick the right name. They have complex systems for determining names and know their way around trademark laws.? The downside is that they can cost up to $80 000 and take anywhere from six weeks to six months to complete the naming process. You probably won't have that much time or money to spend, but plan to spend at least a few weeks on selecting a name and if you follow these 8 key steps you won?t go too far wrong.
Sally Tomkotowicz is a strategic marketing manager specialising in digital marketing, with over 9 years experience working in online and offline marketing and has spent the last 3 years in the domain name & hosting industry at Names.co.uk.
Source: http://www.thenextwomen.com/2013/03/29/8-considerations-when-naming-your-business
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