Help me Name My Business

starpointe

I own a book called the Design-It-Yourself Graphic Workshop by Chuck Green (ISBN


1-59253-088-5) that has a whole section on naming your business.  It was $40 but you could always just go to Barnes & Noble and have a good read.  There are companies out there that charge thousands of dollars for their naming services but Chuck shares some of their secrets in the book for coming up with logical, memorable, unique names.  It`s definitely worth considering the points he makes.  Keep us posted on your progress.  starpointe2007-1-10 0:32:12

Tangent1

I am done competing here.
If you would like help contact me at [email protected] or visit
tangent-creative.com

One word of wisdom among all these others is to take your customers
perspective. They are probably not skaterboys. They are professionals
looking to you for help and solutions-not the word of the day. I do have
experience in identity work. I have named 2 marketing leading products
and a 80% market share company.
Good luck in your venture

coscooper

Tangent - first, don`t take criticism personally. There are a lot of people who`ve been out there and are trying to offer sound advice. Second, I don`t think some that have posted on this forum are actually in the biz of naming, just been there done that and have been around the block. Wisdom and buyers perspective can help. I`m at a director level that purchases a lot of technology services. The names you proposed are over-used and many are already taken. So, kind of waste of Newkids time really.TechWorks - old consulting company, been around for 20 plus years.Network Solutions
- Large Hosting Domain provider (Oldest in the biz)IT Solutions
- Over-worked and over used.ITworks - Hm???? BORING to me and it`s just my opinion.
Fulcrum Networks (leverage point)
(Fulcrum Microsystems exists)Quantum IT consulting
- Huge hard-drive and tape drive manufacture. They have consulting branch that uses this name.Concept Networks - broadband/DSL providerThese names are boring and as a long time buyer of technical services would a)either get them confused and/or b)look right over the typical. Everyone who can print a business card writes, network this and tech that. BORING!Now, if they`re just hung up on a given name, then some of the naming depends on region versus national. However, if you`d googled most of these names, you`d see that they`re all taken.PS.. I have no vested interest or am self promoting, just offering a perspective.
coscooper2007-1-10 11:50:44

SolidGrnd

I have to agree with Cooper...I think you should stray from the typical IT type name...but not toooooo far away. Personally...I don`t want to have to do a ton of searching to figure out what a company does...it saves me a butt-load of time if I know just by their name what I can expect them to do. For instance...if you call yourself Toys R Us...I expect to find toys not electronics...if you call yourself Spruce Consultants...I am invision some dude with the lastname Spruce...but I have no idea what he consults on, soooo I might pass him up for something that is a sure thing for what I am looking for! There is something to be said for the tried and true forms. That said...I haven`t actually come up with anything...my apologies...it took me MONTHS to come up with anything for my non-profit...and it still didn`t make anyone happy but me...so my other piece of advice...stick to what feels good to YOU...but also represents you. No one knows what you do and how you do it as much as you do...even if you do something that everyone is doing...like IT support services! Your business is YOUR businss...and the name of your company will be equally individual.
Here is what I did:
I wrote down random words that were associated with the industry, the business I do, the work I do, my customers, etc. (it was about 6 pages long when I was done). THEN...I started mixing them around...stuffing them together...I wrote out about 4 pages of possible name ideas...then I went through those and scratched the ones that REALLY made my stomach turn to have to say them or put them on letterhead. The ones that were left, I started looking at marketing ability...how easy would it be to put on a business card, letterhead, or a storefront!? I scratched the ones that just WOULD NOT market easily. I just kept working at it until I had it down to about 5 that I liked, marketed well, and were easy enough to understand...THEN...I asked friends, family, strangers, etc. what their opinions were...eventually...I just threw my hands up and went with the one that felt good for me!
Hope that helps...some! Best of luck! If I think of anything REALLY catchy...I will stop back by and let you know!!

Tangent1

Wow-am I good or what-naming all those companies. LOL

I didn`t take it personally.
Going on limited info and just throwing out ideas and starting points.
Name registration is regional and industry specific and you should do a
quick trademark search to be safe

It`s all subjective-you could make it personal related and you have a ice
breaker on taking about your name.

yourNAMEinDotCom

How about these:IT Pros, Inc.IT Plus By the way, I actually like "Geek Squad" too but that`s just me.

stonesledge

My friend owns a franchise called fastteks and does well.  Sometimes you can`t get awat from a commonly used name b/c you need it to explain what you do. Why name yourself, magnolia only to explain that you are not a flower company but an IT company? TechZoom, Door digital....none of these are good but there are options.

SolidGrnd

FastTek is a cool name actually...I like that one!

kaixer

Once you have some candidate names, you can test them out for free at www.inchorus.com.  You can ask people to vote on the candidate names such as the example below: http://inchorus.com/index.php?page=proj ... ction=view _project&project_id=8Or you can ask ask people what connotation does the name bring up like the example below: http://inchorus.com/index.php?page=proj ... ction=view _project&project_id=22Once you create a question, you can forward it out to your friends and get them to help you.Good luck!Kai

TheBackupMan

I can`t say that I`m any sort of authority on naming a business (my business name could use a make-over!), but I had tried a bunch of different names that just didn`t seem to click for my business.
One that felt the best to me, but I never used, was a combination of letters from my full name.  I came up with Wascoda.  Unusual, yet possibly memorable.
Have you tried doing something along those lines?

ujeans

"Aplaxis Networks"
Heck...Just make up a word.
Google did it.Heck....I did it too when I named my corporation.Actually Google it from a "Peanuts" cartoon, but Charles Schultz may have taken it from somewhere else!

ujeans

What about looking at other languages?  How about "Esperto Technologies".  Esperto is Portuguese for smart.  The bonus is that the domain espertotech.com is available.

rexiedexie

Here is an tip for you.
Whatever you name your business........ Before you do.
Search the name in Google.com   Your better to choose a unique name no-one else has.
So if people search for you or your business name in google....... yours is the only site to be listed at the top of the search.
rexiedexie2007-1-13 6:12:38

stonesledge

So have you decided on a name. Come up with any candidates?

kennerly

My response is about two years too late but I`m excited to announce I just launched a site biz called Titles & Taglines -- to help people come up with catchy taglines, cool names for businesses, books, etc. Hope this helps someone else in search of cool name ideas!
Kennerly Clay
Titles & Taglineswww.titles-and-taglines.comkennerly6/19/2009 10:31 AM