Choosing a name for your business: seems like a no brainer, yet, many people fall into costly problems because they think ahead.
First, it’s all about Memorability. Your business name should stick in people’s minds. Think short, simple, and easy to spell. Think Amazon, eBay or Apple.
Next, consider Relevance. When we first started @oishya_, it was called Japana, as we wanted people (and search engines 🙂 to immediately know that’s something related to Japan. However, we run into few issues including Google auto-correction “Did you mean Japan” when you were typing Japana into their browser – displaying pages about Japan instead of showing our page results.
Ultimately, we rebranded into Oishya (in Japanese “oishii” is loosely translated into tasty, so Oishya is ~ tasty shop).
Your name should also be available. E.g. for both other business Untrite and Oishya we were looking for a name where there was a .com domain available, so we didn’t need to buy it back from their owner for zillions of pounds.
Another critical factor is Uniqueness. Stand out from the crowd. You want the name to recall your flagship product or a lifestyle you’re selling, but you don;’t want to be mistaken for your competitor.
But, hold on – it’s also about scalability. Think long-term. You may be selling Japanese knives now, but what in the future you decide to expand into furniture? Will your name still make sense as your business grows and evolves?
And the last, most painful and costly bit (if you don’t take care of it from the start) – legalities! Ensure your name isn’t already trademarked and secure legal clearance. Monzo, UK’s neobank was initially called “Mondo” (spanish for world), only until 6-8 months into their existence they got a lawsuit for trademark breach. They lost and couldn’t keep their name so they needed to rebrand into Monzo, which cost them A LOT.
If you have a physical product, it’s even more painful, because not only you may need to change all the traces of your breaching name on digital sphere, but also reprint / redo all the logos on your products. Do the due diligence up front, don’t neglect it.
Lastly, get feedback, share your potential names with friends, family, or your target audience. They may point onto something obvious, which you haven’t thought about.
