8 Aspects of A Memorable Business Name
Every well-known brand has one thing in common besides products and services. The one aspect that makes it memorable is the business name.
Join us as we take a deep dive and learn the aspects that make your business name unique and outstanding in your industry. To help maximize your reading time, we divided the blog into three sections.
- How Long Should My Business Name Be?
- 8 Aspects of a Memorable Business Name
- Tips for Creating Your Business Name
How Long Should My Business Name Be?
Let’s look at famous brands worldwide for a better frame of reference. From Nike to Spotify, a common theme for these businesses is that their names are short yet memorable—it has a WOW factor that sticks to the mind of your market.
But the real question comes at minimum, maximum, and recommended length. For business name ideas, we talk in characters. Each letter and punctuation mark is counted as a character.
Minimum: 4-6 characters
Maximum: 30 characters
Recommended: 7-15 characters
With those in mind, let’s consider what makes up your business name.
8 Aspects of a Memorable Business Name
Like how brand voice and other elements of your branding, a business name can be dissected into various parts, after countless hours of research, we found eight that make your business name memorable.
The aspects below are in no particular order of emphasis, so basically, it’s like a checklist to see if your business name is right for you and get your point across to your market.
Type of Name
For the first pointer, we will check which category your business name falls into; determining this allows you to take control of the perception of your market through the combination of letters.
There are five categories your name could call under:
- Coined Names: Uniquely yours and has a deeper meaning behind it.
- Descriptive Names: These are the names that describe your product or service but with a touch of play on words.
- Abstract Names: Little to no connection with the business, but it has a strong association because of the impression you made with it.
- Acronyms: These are the lettermarks or initials of your business name, like IGN or IBM.
- Founders’ or Partners’ Names: These are the long forms or wordmarks of business names.
Symbols
The next aspect of your name is the symbols you may want to add. An example of this could be Yahoo!
It’s an acronym for “Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle.” They made the name into a collection of initials and added an exclamation mark for that solid and fun vibe.
Aside from that, the word Yahoo means expressing great joy or excitement, so their business name has two meanings, personal and literal. With that example, you can see why adding a symbol to your name changes your company’s brand voice.
Clarity
Next, we look at understanding your market about your business name. This portion tests if your business name reaches the people you want to achieve.
Let’s say you’re in the food or automotive industry. Examples we could cite are Subway and Tesla.
Subway is the name of a fast food chain offering sandwiches. When you read the name, was it clear what they were offering? The answer is yes because of the effective branding around their name.
Tesla offers electric cars that don’t need oil to run but need recharging. When you heard this big name, you understood they’re a car brand, right?
That’s what it means to have clarity in a business name. When your market here of it, they associate it with your product or service, and it is spelled legibly.
Authenticity
Third, we have the authenticity of your business name. This portion means your name is aligned with what you sell and market. For gaming business names, it must be something fun and memorable.
You can use emotional design here or the marketing style you adopt. Take a look at Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Spotify, and Subway.
Coca-Cola and Pepsi maintain their values and mission to provide customers with refreshing carbonated soft drinks. They ensure that the traditional and modern branding that each of them promotes themselves as stays the same through the years.
On the other hand, Spotify keeps its reputation as a music streaming service and adds its twist by creating playlists for customers’ moods on a particular day.
Lastly, we have Subway. Their sub sandwiches are served with consistency. Their tactics are especially true through their advertisements.
As long as your business name reflects who you are as a business, it’s considered authentic.
Font Style
Third, to the last, we have font styles. It’s a debate between serifs vs. sans serifs. The former gives off a fun or elegant vibe because of its tail.
At the same time, sans serifs give off a professional, no-BS vibe since it’s composed of lines. Though, if you’re going for a minimalist style, this typeface is for you.
As a business, you need to determine which one you’ll use to help you identify how your whole brand identity would look.
Defensible
This portion is seen through the lens of the legal system. Your business name must not be red-tagged for plagiarism or copyright laws.
Plagiarism tackles the ideas behind your name. You must cite them properly to ensure you didn’t copy any argument, especially when you claim originality.
For copyright infringement, this portion boils down to the execution of design when it comes to your business name. Your typeface comes in here, and it’s great to have a custom to ensure originality.
Memorable
Your name idea needs to be catchy, something your customers can say without a hitch, and they remember positive experiences with your brand.
Short and sweet is the recommended character count, like Nike or Dunkin’. Just ensure that the quality of your product and services stays consistent.
Enduring
Lastly, we have the enduring aspect of your business name. You must last a decade (10 years) to call yourself a successful brand.
That’s the ultimate goal when deciding the name that’ll represent you. You want to be the provider of what your customers want and need for generations to come.
Still with us? We’re almost done. Get to know the tips on how to create a business name below.
Tips for Creating Your Business Name
Ready to enhance your business name for success? Let’s dive into the various best practices for business name creation.
We found seven ways to help you formulate the best name for your brand.
- Compare and Contrast with Competitors
- Establish Business Persona
- NO to Industry Jargon
- Clarity is Key
- Research the availability of URLs and Social Media Handles
- Test the Timelessness of Your Business Name
- Trademarking is a Must
1. Compare and Contrast with Competitors
As we said earlier, avoiding any red flags for plagiarism is better. The best way to do that is through research.
Look at the trends and your niche itself. What are common themes and keywords you could use or not use since your competitors already have them in their name?
Answer that, and you get a picture of your finalized business name.
2. Establish a Business Persona
As our blog on brand voice mentions, a business persona may help you decide your name. When you know the values, mission, vision, and personality archetype you want for your business, your name should reflect that.
You can use Carl Jung’s psychological archetypes to help give your business name personality. You’re creating a character that your customers may relate to, and it shapes how you’ll serve them too.
Take Wendy’s, for example. They have a literal Wendy on social media platforms that reply to comments and say sassy or witty phrases that help their marketing scheme.
3. NO to Industry Jargon
Next, we urge you to understand your market. They won’t know who you are if only people from your niche understand you.
If you had Saturated Conture as your name, not many people would get that you’re a skincare brand, or it could have a negative connotation too, since saturated could mean over the desired shade.
Look back at aspects of a business name and look at the type. Even if your name is unique, your market doesn’t understand what you sell or your business type.
You need to use terms everyone would understand.
4. Clarity is Key
We cannot stress this portion enough, but your business name needs to be as clear as day. It doesn’t only mean the literal meaning, like when you see the name Northern Foodstop or Otaku Corner.
This portion also pertains to your design. That means your business name is legible wherever your name is seen, like on social media posts, ad campaigns, or even packaging or label design.
Your font style and the language of your name need to be clear from the get-go, so your market can distinguish you from competitors.
5. Research the availability of URLs and Social Media Handles
Social media and website design are essential, especially in digital marketing. Your handles and domain name must be unique so your market can easily find you.
Aside from that, it makes you look legitimate when you have various platforms and gain a broader audience to help your engagement and reach. You can even make your business name your logo design with our logo maker to improve your branding.
6. Test the Timelessness of Your Business Name
Second, to the last, try giving your name a dry run. Ask a close friend or a sample market to provide you with feedback on your business name, then tweak it.
You can also do the work and research again if you finalized your name, and don’t forget to look at the trends and possibly the SEO side of things.
Also, you can have a brand kit and mock-ups made. A brand kit helps you pair your name with various design aspects like fonts, color palettes, logo designs, and more.
You can see your name for mock-ups on real-world examples like merchandise design or print advertisements.
7. Trademarking is a Must
Lastly, to protect yourself and your original idea, get trademarked. From your name to other design elements, trademarking will help you retain your creative freedom for around ten years before you need to renew.
Customize Your Business Name Today!
There you have it, our complete dissection of everything about your business name. To summarize:
- The recommended character count for your business name is 7 to 15 characters.
- There are eight aspects to your business name.
- For ideas on how to start naming your business:
- Research
- Pick a Business Persona
- No Jargons, please
- Clear and Concise
- Social Media Matters
- Have a Dry Run
- And trademark your business.
Ensure your business practices are consistent by adding your name to business cards, invoices, posters, animated posts, and more.
Brand better with a catchy and memorable business name today.
