Naming Your Business

YOU HAVE THE BUSINESS ALL THOUGHT OUT, BUT WHAT ABOUT THE NAME?

Naming your business can sometimes be the most daunting part of getting started. You want it to be just right, the perfect reflection of what you offer and who you’re trying to reach. In a way, your business is your baby, so you want to do right by it, to give it a name that is fitting. This is often where people get stuck, because where on earth do you even begin when it comes to finding that perfect name? Let’s dive into it.

FINDING THE RIGHT WORDS

STEP ONE - MAKE A LIST

It’s all about finding the right words. So instead of starting with a fully thought out name, start with a few words. You’ll want to first start by making a list of words that come to mind when you think about your business. These can be anything, and I mean anything that pops into your head while jotting them down. Don’t overthink this part, as the words start rolling, just write them down. Write down as many as you’d like. You can set a timer, or set a number of words, or just fill up a page. I suggest doing this with pen and paper, it helps the creativity flow.

Here’s an example of what my list might look like

• Design

• Illustrations

• Nature

• Trees

• Organic

• Passionate

• Artist

• Timeless

• Creative

• Logos

• Packaging

• Roadtrips

• Camping

• Typography

Now that I’ve made my list, it’s time to move to step two.

STEP TWO - CIRCLE STAND OUT WORDS

For this step, you’ll take a look at all the words you just dumped on paper, and circle 3-4 words that REALLY stand out to you. The ones that are just popping off the page, the ones that you wrote down more than once. Now, you’ll make a list of those 3-4 words that you picked and then find synonyms for each word (you can use https://www.thesaurus.com/ ). Find at least 6-10 for each word. Here’s an example of what my list looks like.

• Design

  • drawing

  • idea

  • perspective

  • concept

  • plan

  • blueprint

  • map

  • layout

  • treatment

  • form

• Creative

  • original

  • cool

  • intuitive

  • innovational

  • productive

  • visionary

• Nature

  • essence

  • texture

  • complexion

  • drift

  • traits

  • heart

STEP THREE - NARROWING THINGS DOWN

Now that you’ve made your second list, go through the synonyms and your circled words and start making different combinations of the words you’ve discovered. Play around with these, have fun with it, and let this stage be a brainstorming session of seeing what works and what doesn’t work. You’ll start to see things become more narrowed down, and you may even find new words that come to mind as you begin working with the words you’ve already written down.

MAKING DECISIONS

During this whole process of discovering your name, it’s important to go into it with an open mind. Sometimes the best ideas and names come to us when we aren’t thinking about it too hard.

STEP FOUR - TIME TO DECIDE

Now that you’ve narrowed things down and have some name ideas in front of you, it’s time to refine and polish at least 2-3 of the names you’ve come up with. Write these names down and put them in places you will see often, write them on a sticky note and stick them on your fridge, your mirror, wherever – this will help you start to see them daily and then it’ll help you decide which one starts to become a favorite.

NOW YOU HAVE YOUR NAME, IT’S TIME TO CELEBRATE

Naming your business and being excited about it is no small feat, so you should definitely celebrate once you’ve finally decided! Now that things are official, it’s time to make them officially official. Here’s a list of things you will need to do now in order to make sure your business name is available, and to make it legally yours. This list is in no particular order, and is not limited to just these steps.

• Register your business as a trade name, you can do this on your official state government website. This will also let you know if it is available to register.

• Set up your business entity with your official name - Sole Proprietor, LLC, etc. You can usually do this on the same website you register your trade name.

• Get your Tax EIN number

• Check and see if a domain is available, once you find one that works, purchase it!

• See which social handles are available and claim them.

• Set up your business bank account with your new business name

Now that you have your name, ready for some branding and a website?! We would love to help you!