In theory "naming" it is the most straight forward activity when building a business, create a product, or come up with a new service idea. In practice, however, it is not all that easy. This Hack helps you with picking the right name for your business, product or service.
The Hack?
Expectant parents spend hours and hours deciding over what to call their unborn baby, and in a way, you should be equally concerned when it comes to naming your business. After all, your precious business is just another "baby" of yours. Just do not take it as far as to call your business "Baby Harry", unless you really want to. Either way, the point I am trying to make is that naming your business takes time, and it should take time. There are a number of considerations that go into it:
- You probably want it to be creative, timeless, recognisable and most importantly memorable.
- You also want to pick a name whose Domain is still available!
- Pick a name that is unique so on Search Engines you face less competition.
- Another SEO consideration may be that your company and hence domain name relates or contains the name of the product or service you offer. It will save you plenty of money and resources when it comes to SEO in the short- and long-run.
As you can see, there is a good reason why most of the time coming up with the perfect name can take hours and hours (a little like labour, really.)
However, do not despair, as we have quick-fix solution up to our sleeve, called crowdsourcing. Turns out crowdsourcing also works for names, logos and other fancy things, and is not just limited to raise funds. The rule of thumb is if you ever get the opportunity to seize the power of the crowd, go for it! Naming Force does just that. In exchange for as little as £200, you get up to 800 business name suggestions in return. Mind you, these suggestions are not machine-generated but submitted by creatives who apparently love to name businesses and are really good at it.
What to use?
NamingForce.com which costs £200 for 800+ names.
Time to Hack it!
- Create a detailed brief that explains what your business does and what it is all about. The better you summarise activities of your business as well as the purpose of your products and service the more relevant submitted suggestions will be.
- NameForce.com is running a contest based on your brief, where the winner takes it all, minus NamingForces cut. So rest assured you will get relevant and creative ideas in return for your investment.
- Once you get initial brainstorming ideas you can give feedback that goes directly to the names creator. Take advantage of that feature as to fine-tune creative submissions, and improve the likelihood of ending up with the best possible name for your business, product and service.
- Once you have selected some names that tickle your fancy, Naming Force carries out some market research to find out which ones are the most popular. £200 well spent!
- Naming Force will create a list with your results, which also includes basic stats on UK and US trademark availability and domain name availability. £200 even better spent!
- Choose your favourite name and have a little party. Naming Force will pay the wining "namer", and they'll probably have a party too.
Up your game!
Occasionally an idea submitted by a "namer" will spark inspiration for an even better name. So it's a good idea to be open-minded and creative throughout this process for optimal results.