10 Tips For Naming Your Business
Naming your business can be challenging and time consuming. Here are 10 proven tips that should help you come up with a great business name.
How we compare
crowdspring | NamingForce | |
Huge community of namers | ||
Custom creative briefs | ||
Private briefs and galleries | ||
Better paid creatives (better results) | ||
100% money-back guarantee | ||
Advanced project management | ||
Leading IP protections | ||
Free custom legal contracts | ||
Preferred by the world's best Brands | ||
Preferred by customers | ||
Team collaboration | ||
Logo Design | ||
Product and industrial design | ||
Naming projects start at... | $299 | $199 |
Best Value! |
Your company's brand identity is everything visual about your brand, including the name of your company or organization. It's impossible for a business to create a great brand identity and impress customers and prospects with a boring name already used by other businesses.
An online business name generator can't help - they offer generic, uninspiring names that make it impossible for customers to fall in love with your unique company.
Crowdspring is different. Our global team helps clients find unique, custom names (and matching domains) with a dramatically simple process. It's never been easier to get captivating business name ideas or product name ideas - suggested by real people, not machines - that will delight your customers and set you apart from your bland competition.
We have everything you need in a fresh, easy-to-use interface (project management, namer discovery, feedback, IP protections for the work you're buying, award-winning customer service, and more) for a price that's 25 to 50 times less than you would pay an agency. Guaranteed!
Crowdspring makes the work of finding your perfect business name or product name a fun, interactive experience - we won't be surprised if you forget that you're actually working.
Stop wasting your valuable time elsewhere. Over 220,000 talented creatives from 195 countries work on crowdspring.
Terrific business names that drive results. If your naming project doesn’t receive at least 100 entries, just let us know within 30 days and we'll promptly refund what you paid.
All the support you need, when you need it. Our dedicated support team (99% customer satisfaction) is available by phone, email, and chat to ensure your success.
Powerful intellectual property protections, made simple. Every project includes industry leading customized legal contracts and policies that protect your intellectual property.
Brand story provided by creative mt1895.
'A great tagline (bonus) would be: You can't say Asabasa Spice Co. without first saying AHH. Asabasa is a fun word I like to say when I am feeling great and relaxed. It has no meaning and is not associated with any language from my research. The name is a palindrome which can be spelled and pronounced the same forward or backwards - which means no matter which way you look at it, it still says AHHH (HOW COOL IS THAT!) The name can indeed be trademarked in the USA for sure. It can be branded and it surely has character & personality. The name is essentially just ONE word and only seven characters and uses only three letters.'
'Clink has a double meaning - the sound two glasses make during CHEERS. :) And, it's slang for jail - a reference to the historic building your brewery occupies. The name is fun, easy to say, spell and remember, and the reference to a sound 'clink' and to water makes it a memorable name.'
'The name has only 5 letters, it pronounces equally in many languages and there is a nice meaning to it (latin for castle, fortress).'
A brand is a name, term, design, or symbol that differentiates a business, organization, firm, product or services from its rivals, in the eyes of the customer.
A strong brand name communicates what your company does, how it does it, and at the same time, establishes trust and credibility with your prospects and customers. Strong business names are important for every type of entity, including corporations, partnerships, limited liability companies (LLC), LLP, PLC, joint ventures, and others.
Business names can be real words, made-up words, or combinations of words. For example, Hospira, a name selected by the company's employees, was derived from the words hospital, spirit, inspire, and the Latin word spero, which means hope. Bosch, a German diversified technology-based corporation, was named after its founder, Robert Bosch.
Some famous companies started operating under different names but later changed those names. For example, Google was initially called BackRub. Pepsi-Cola was initially called Brad's Drink. Sony was initially known as Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo. BP, formerly British Petroleum, was shortened as part of a rebranding effort in 2000.
Some companies choose to operate under a trade name, or trading name, which is a pseudonym frequently used by companies to operate under a name different from their registered legal name.
If you have an existing name that no longer fits your brand, you can learn more about the why and how to rename your business, and review the 10 tips for naming your startup or small business on our award-winning business marketing blog.
Some services claim they can help you create business names and check domain availability instantly by using computers instead of real people.
The truth is that computers can help generate random, unique names, but how many of those names will actually be a foundation for a strong brand?
There's a reason the world's best marketers, agencies, and Brands rely on real people to name companies and not on algorithms. In fact, none of the most successful companies in the United States or anywhere else in the world were named by a machine.
A name generator, whether it's a free business name generator or one for which you pay, will just spit out lots of random words, not actual brands. Business name generators are unimaginative and uninspired.
So whether you're a first-time entrepreneur seeking strong company name ideas or have an existing business considering a rebrand, avoid algorithmic business name generators and get the perfect name for your business from real people, not machines.
And if you get your new catchy business name from crowdspring, you'll get not just terrific new name ideas, but you'll also get suggestions for the perfect domain name that matches the name of the business.
Naming projects run for 7 days, but you can shorten them to as little as 1 day if you're in a hurry. Many entries come in the last few days of a project, and we encourage you to wait until the project ends before picking your favorite (tell us if you want to close the project early). You can extend your project for free, up to 7 more days if you need more time.
Naming packages start at $299, while projects with a single creative (1-to-1 projects) start at $200. All packages include the award to the creative and crowdspring's fee, a custom legal contract giving you full rights to the name you're buying, four award-winning customer support, tools and platform. You can select packages and features based on what you need and your budget. You will always know up front exactly what you'll pay, with no hidden costs and no surprises.
Absolutely! Every project on crowdspring is protected by a custom legal contract giving you full rights to the name you're buying. If you have multiple awards, you'll have separate contracts for each. Once the contract is signed and the creative is paid after you approve the name you picked, you can use the name any way you like. You can change it or alter it in any way – it's yours.
The non-winning names remain the property of the person who suggested those names. This means you may not use those other names in any way. But we give you an easy way to add awards and make offers in your projects when you find more than one name you love.
You'll see dozens of names from multiple creatives. The more active you are in the project, the more name suggestions you will get. We'll let you know every time a new name or comment comes in and invite you to give feedback. Years of experience show us that projects with active clients will receive more than double the names compared to projects with low client participation.
Absolutely! In fact, this is a key factor for success. Once the names start rolling in, let the creatives know what you think about their name suggestions. You can score and give individual feedback. You can also update your brief if you want to address all participants in your project. They are happy to make changes and iterate on their suggestions.
When you score each name suggestion (1 to 5 stars), your score and comments are private. Only you and the individual creative will see the star rating and comments on their name. Updates to your brief are public for all participants in the project.
Like more than one name? It happens all the time. You can start your project with multiple awards or add awards at any time during your project. You can also make offers on additional names after your project has been awarded.
You have seven days to select your favorite name after the project closes. Sometimes, you might need an extra few days. Just let us know when that happens.
In naming projects, you'll have a private area to complete the project with the creative you chose. If you have more than one award, you'll have a separate wrap-up with each creative. You'll sign the contract and confirm the name and that's it - it's yours.
Yes! When creatives submit name ideas, they'll also let you know if an accompanying domain is available for registration or if one is available for purchase from a third-party (and the price).
Crowdspring is the first stop for any aspiring entrepreneur, whether bootstrapped or VC-backed. The creative power of the their crowd is unmatched anywhere.
The name of your company distinguishes your company, products or services from its rivals in the eyes of your customers and potential customers. A company's name can be derived from other words (often, English or Latin) or it can be a made-up word. In fact, many famous company names have unique name etymologies.
If you want to stand out from your competitors, stay far away from free company or business name generators because you'll end up with a generic, uninspiring name.
Here are the 10 things you should consider when deciding on a new name for a company or business:
For more details on each of these, read 10 tips for finding the best name for your business. You'll find tons more popular articles about naming your business, plus reviews from our customers, lower on this page.
It’s not easy to name a new company or product. At times, it feels like every name in the dictionary is already taken. And just when you think you have found the perfect name, you realize that you can’t get the matching domain name. Naming consultants want to charge you thousands or tens of thousands of dollars to help name your company or product. Few business owners can afford such fees.There’s a better alternative.
Crowdspring is home to the world's best creative team.
Unlike the traditional freelancer or agency market, crowdspring is a crowdsourcing marketplace. On crowdspring, tens of thousands of creatives from over 195 countries around the world compete for your business. You will get choice when you look to name your new business or product that you will not get anywhere else. In fact, we guarantee that you'll get at least 100 name suggestions. If you don't find a name you like when you receive fewer than 100 suggestions, we'll refund your fees in full – no questions asked.
Our unique model and process addresses many of the concerns encountered when pricing naming a business or product. We take a lot of the work and stress out of the equation for you: you won't need to get quotes in advance for the work, or interview people or agencies.
Your set the price for your project, and creatives from around the world will suggest names (and URLs) to your project for you to review. When your project ends, you choose the name you like the best. It’s that simple!
Absolutely! If your naming project doesn't receive at least 100 entries, we'll promptly refund all your money. We're not happy until you're happy. Our guarantee shows that we stand behind our promise to make you happy.
Our 220,000+ designers, product designers and namers from Australia to Zimbabwe, and everywhere in between, are standing by to help you. Obviously not everyone will be working on your project, but you'll see dozens participate in each project, so you'll get lots of choices you won't find elsewhere.
You'll find sophisticated project management tools that let you focus on getting a great result from your project. You'll be able to score, comment, sort, filter, invite collaborators, and more.
Yes. You can launch projects with private briefs and private galleries and you can require participants to agree to non-disclosure agreements before they can participate in your project. You also can exclude the project from search engines. Our privacy features scale to fit your needs (it's one reason we work with many agencies, who value such flexibility).
Not to worry! We offer simple, easy to use tools that help you write a custom creative brief for your project. We'll walk you through a short interview and then will write the creative brief for you immediately after you post your project!
Protecting the intellectual property of both clients and creatives is very important to us. In fact, since our launch in 2008, crowdspring has been the market leader when it comes to the protection of intellectual property. It helps that our founder was an experienced and successful intellectual property attorney. We have both written policies and internal practices designed to protect intellectual property. And we NEVER publicly display names in your projects, unlike the competition.
First, crowdspring's Copyright Policy makes it easy for copyright owners to report alleged violations of their intellectual property rights.
Second, crowdspring's User Agreement prohibits, among other things, people from selling, reproducing, modifying, displaying, preparing derivative works from, reposting, or using the content found on crowdspring.com without the express written permission from the owner of the work.
We have also has adopted Standards of Conduct for Creatives and Standards of Conduct for Clients. Each of these policies touches on the importance of intellectual property in our community.
We also make it easy for anyone to submit potential IP violations for review by a trained crowdspring panel. The panel reviews and responds to these submissions in writing, promptly.
Finally, every project on crowdspring is protected by a custom, dynamic legal contract that transfers full rights to the winning work in your project, to you. If you have multiple awards, you’ll have separate legal contracts for each award.
We work with startups, small businesses, agencies and non-profits in the United States and 100 other countries. But we also work with large Brands. In fact, not a single other site in the industry has done work for the likes of Amazon, Microsoft, LG, TiVo, Starbucks, Philips, Forbes, ConAgra, Epic Records, Random House, Dallas Mavericks, Citysearch, Freakonomics, the House Ways and Means Committee, Tony Robbins, Grolsch, Barilla, Dish Network, Economist, Fandango, Doritos, Air New Zealand and countless others.
Yes! You can invite your friends, colleagues, and clients to help you manage your project.
Don't take our word for it. 96% of crowdspring customers recommend us to their friends and colleagues for design and naming services. Here are some crowdspring reviews from an independent third party to help you decide. Importantly, we survey our customers every time they talk with our customer support team. We're very proud of the fact that 99% of our customers are happy with our customer support. We guarantee you'll be happy. We promise.
A generic business name such as Bob's Consulting Company or Joe's Photography isnt't sufficiently memorable and won't set you apart from your competitors. You may also have problems registering or trademarking a generic name. You also should avoid geographic names - especially if you plan to sell products or services over the Internet to a global audience.
Yes. Keep the business name short and make it easy to pronounce and spell. Some new businesses make the mistake of picking what sounds like a cool name - but one that is very difficult for people to pronounce or spell. If people can't pronounce or spell your business name, they'll have difficulty recommending your business to their friends and colleagues.
Don't restrict your products or services by narrowly describing your business. Think about how your business might evolve over time, and make sure that the business name can evolve with the business. For example, although crowdspring started as a graphic design business, we always anticipated branching into other markets and therefore, wanted to find a name that wasn't closely tied to graphic design.
When you pick your business name, you should think a bit about how the name will translate into a visual identity. It's premature to start picturing your logo design when you name the company, but most people associate words with images, so it's important for you to consider this as you pick your company name. Make sure that the images your business name conjures up in prospective customers are positive. Once you have a strong name, you'll want to think about ways to strengthen the name with a great logo design.
The short answer is that creatives on crowdspring suggest not only names, but also URLs to accompany those names!
Now it's not always possible to find an identical URL when you have a name you love. But that's a smaller problem today than it used to be.
The number of people who type in URLs is shrinking every day. Small business owners still seem to be obsessing over getting the pure URL as MyCompanyName.com, but the larger organizations have adapted. The URL is becoming much less important. Nowadays people are putting the name into Google to find sites. The sad fact is that the vast majority of names we consider are ‘camped’ by squatters hoping to make a quick buck. If you don’t have deep pockets or a convincing story to share you’re going to get taken to the cleaners.
Google is a great tool for getting around this issue—if you’ve got a strong brand and you’re getting links from people you’ll end up as the number one response for your name even if it isn’t the pure dotcom domain.
The major search engines, like Google, Bing, and Yahoo, all index your company name. That means it's really important to think carefully before coming up with a name for your business. Are you facing heavy competition from others in your industry? Is your name confusing for the industry it belongs to? Is the name so generic that people cannot find it?
SInce you'll be competing with other businesses in your industry for search results, you'll have to get pretty crafty. Make sure that the name you choose for your company gives you an advantage and doesn't act as a hindrance to how readily searchable you are on the web.
Big companies run focus group tests to ask potential customers how they feel about a possible business name or product name. You can do something very similar by running prospective names by your friends, family, or your customers or potential customers. You also can ask your vendors or suppliers. These informal focus groups might suggest some improvements or might offer some feedback on why certain names are better than other company names.
Whether you're starting a new business or looking to grow an existing business, we've pulled together some of our best resources to help you.
If you are ready to become your own boss and wonder how to start a business in 2021, we have a complete guide that will help you to get started quickly.
If you are ready to bring your business online, read this terrific guide on how to start an eCommerce business in 2021.
If you are a respected expert in a particular field and want to know how to start a consulting business, we have you covered too.
If you already have a specific industry in mind, we can help. For example, if you're wondering how to start a successful clothing brand or clothing line, we've put together everything you need to know to become a successful apparel entrepreneur.
And if you're wondering how to start a photography business or how to start an Etsy shop, we've put together terrific guides that can help you to get started right away.
Whether your business is existing or new, you should make sure that you have a strong brand identity for that business. A brand identity is the most effective way a business can gain a competitive edge in an increasingly crowded marketplace.
And if you are running out of marketing ideas and your marketing campaigns are falling flat, have you tried some new techniques? For example, some companies are finding great success with chatbot marketing.
Naming your business can be challenging and time consuming. Here are 10 proven tips that should help you come up with a great business name.
What should you do if your business name isn’t effective? Here are 4 reasons to rename your business and 7 tips to do it successfully.
Unsure if your small business or startup is in need of a new name? Take a look at 5 top startups that have changed their name.
Our award-winning dedicated customer support team has a 99% satisfaction rating, and can help by phone, mail and chat.
We're happy only when you are.
Our support team is always ready to help you with a free, no obligation design consultation.