Business Beginnings: Your Company Name

Set to Soar or Destined for Doom?

By Donna Dahl

What is the hardest thing about starting a new business?

Some would say that naming your business is the hardest thing. Giving your business a unique, all-inclusive name is the key to your identity. Your name declares your contribution to the consumer, your unique approach, your marketability, your value and the strength of your motivation. Your business name tells who you are and what you do. It defines your target market and sets the course for your future in business. Your name does a lot.

Naming is complex. Professional namers can help but, if you want to name your company yourself, you have some research to do. Not just any name will do.

What IS in a name? EVERYTHING! Your business name is unique to your business. It becomes part of your intellectual property. It is a big part of setting expectations and directing customer traffic to you. In short, it can be strongest statement in all your business communications.

Let’s take a look at a few examples.

Where does the value-added uniqueness of your business belong? Pretend your name is May and you have a business named May’s Cleaners. May’s Cleaners may accurately describe that you have a cleaning service but we have no idea what you clean. Your business name may be enough for bank identification purposes but little else. At the very least you will need a tag line to support the name.

If you had chosen “Crystal Clear Window Washers” with a tag line like “Where dirt hits the sills running,” you create an entirely different image of May’s cleaning service. The business name alone describes the service and the tag line adds impact. The business is now poised to be able to be of value to a future buyer…given that the name is available. Furthermore, this business is poised to become a franchise operation.

Please note that the names chosen for the purpose of this article are only for illustrative purposes. May these examples be helpful in developing ideas for your own naming exercise. No names have been evaluated for their availability.

Build a solid bridge to your business door, not a moat with an iffy crossing. Many business names have been created as a result of creatively conjoining the names of the partners or principals. So-Jak Services, for example, might show relationship but have no distinct meaning all by itself. The company owners may discover that they are spending so much time explaining the nature of their business that they have to do their customer qualifying one customer at a time. In addition, names with interesting spellings can make you hard to find.

Customers like to self-qualify. Give them a chance. Luigi’s Italian Restaurant, for instance, allows that. You would not choose Luigi’s if you are looking for Asian food.

Names have marketing value, too. Giant Chinese gooseberries weren’t selling very well until they were renamed. Now that they are called Kiwifruit, the fruit has world-wide appeal. Australian bush nuts are now called macadamias. Would you have the courage to change your business name if you thought it was in your best interests?

Shades of paint can take on new realms of popularity with a new name. If you were looking for just the right shade of red…without actually seeing the colour…which name would be more appealing: rusty red or canyon crimson?

Sometimes alliteration – the repeated use of the same letter (or sound) emits an emotional connection. The words, “Zoom, Zoom,” from the Mazda commercial are, indeed, memorable. Furthermore, the “z” and the “m” in “zoom” are also in Mazda. Clever!

Shakespeare wrote, “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” The new name would not alter the distinct scent of the rose. However, renaming the rose would alter our expectation of the scent. The name tells us what to expect. Would you agree?

If you were blindfolded and asked to smell a rose, would your nose know it was a rose? Let your business card communicate your business name. Allow it to FEEL and LOOK like it is a representation of your business. How much of the character of your business can you portray within this little messenger? It is, after all, a symbol of your vision of your business.

So if you are thinking of renaming your business or you are stuck on a few possible names that still don’t “feel” right, that’s okay. Your business name is likely to be around for a long time. Many of you took nine months to name your first child, didn’t you? Work with a graphic artist. Arrange for several proofs. Print 100 of your favourite version. Survey your client base. Does the name of your business and your sample business card connect with your targeted customer? Asking for this feedback may be the most valuable thing you do to name your company and get it started on the right foot!

Some would say that describing the nature of the business to others is the hardest thing. Summing up your business focus in a sentence or two is a must. If your business name is not self-explanatory, your tag line may say it all. If neither of these describes your business in a nice, neat package that could easily be remembered and repeated, you have work to do. Was there a tag line on that sample concept you produced? If not, your feedback system may offer some possibilities for a fitting descriptive phrase that describes you, too.

Your business name, your tagline and your distinct business image instantly give us the focus of your business. It is important that you like these, that they work together for you and that you are so SOLD on them that you could proudly display them on a billboard. Whether you change the name of your business, keep the name and change the image, or start over from scratch, avoid limiting your scope and give your name the license to be the most productive member of your sales team!

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Donna Dahl, WIN Show Host at The Tenacious Marketer Show, and author of Tradeshows: Building Your Thirty-Second Business and Demystifying Marketing, may be contacted at donna@makoye.com for expert consultative services. Her books are available at www.makoye.com