You can concentrate on the technology and marketing principles all you want, but a large part of digital marketing falls back on your unique branding that stems from basic choices you make during the development stages of your business.
Your name, logo and other less controlled associations will play a part in public perception for the life of your business, so it’s important to make informed decisions from the start. The Internet is going to offer your business a huge pedestal to be seen from; the challenge is akin to managing the lighting so your brand is viewed in a positive way.
This can be very difficult indeed thanks to scrapers and spammers flooding search results, past customers who might have had a bad experience and want to make it known, and any brands that use similar keywords or names that dominate key Google results.
The truth is, your brand is not automatically protected online. If you fail to properly protect your reputation, including through social media, you run the risk of being viewed as less credible than your competitors. This could keep your company from ever succeeding, or even worse, affect your personal life.
What many people fail to understand though is that many of reputation problems can be prevented even before the brand name is even born! And here’s how!
What to Do *Before* You Pick a Brand Name
Today choosing a good brand name is even more important than ever: Your brand name is what is going to secure you stable search engine positions and it’s also what is going to stick in your visitors’ mind.
Here are a few tools to check once you think you have a few good options in mind:
1. Use Namify
I just cannot say enough great things about this business name generator. Not only is it using a smart algorithm to find some cool names based on your niche
It will also check your chosen name across major social media platforms and create a logo for you:
2. Google Search
The first step is getting a clear picture of how original your brand name is. I always suggest doing a Google search for your brand, whether that is a company name, a product or yourself. Then take a close look at the result.
Use Google Search to see what the Internet shows for your brand name. Try mispellings to check for negative results that are slightly different.
Here are two main questions to answer before you go further:
- Do you see your future name already in use in some way? Will it be too difficult to compete with? (For example, if a Wikipedia article ranks #1 for your future brand name search, bear in mind you are unlikely to beat it. Search marketers have been struggling to drop wiki to #2 for [seo] for ages and these are the best SEO pros!)
- Is your future name considered to be a misspelling by Google? (Mind that it will be very hard and time-consuming to overcome)
The answers will show you clearly whether you need to give this brand another test!
2. Urban Dictionary
Internet jargon is unpredictable: you never know which meme resulted in a new negative connotation to a semi-ordinary word or phrase. Therefore it’s a smart idea to refer to the slang glossary to make sure your future brand bears no negative association which will be hard to get rid of.
You may find that the non-threatening brandable domain you picked up has a double meaning that will infer negative connotations.
Tip: Always refer to “Related” phrases in the left-hand column as we as tags under the listing:
3. Social Media Moniker Checks
You need to have full control of your brand, which means if someone has already registered your brand name as a moniker at a major social media site, you might be in trouble:
- Facebook only allows /username to be used once and it’s almost impossible to change it;
- Twitter will only help you claim your brand name is the trademark law is involved;
- Claiming your brand name later is a long process. You better avoid it if you can.
Note: I am mentioning username check at the end on purpose: If you really love your future name choice and it has passed the first two tests, maybe you will still stick to it even if it has already been grabbed on Twitter (Besides, with hundreds of millions Twitter users across the world, each user holding a unique moniker, it’s getting harder and harder to come up with easily-branded catchy usernames).
The first thing you’ll want to do when you settle on a brand name is register all social media accounts. You may find that an associated Twitter ID or Facebook Page URL is already taken, but that is common in today’s digital environment.
However if your future brand name is massively in use, you probably want to stay away from it.
Tip: Use a username or brand name checker that will search social media accounts and other websites to give you every available instance of your name, and direct you to those who might already be using it.
Conclusion
When it comes to choosing a brand name, there is probably no perfect choice. I am sure “Google” seemed a stupid name once as well as “Cuil” did. Yet, the first one appeared a hit (and turned out to be hilariously easily branded) while the latter never picked up. It’s hard to predict!
However if you want to future-proof your brand, you should at least pay attention to obvious red flags. It can be tricky, but with a bit of know-how and some effort you can really avoid being trapped by your own choice when it’s too late to change anything!
- Why I Blog, and Why You (and Your Business) Should Too - September 27, 2024
- How To Promote Your Ebook On Twitter - May 30, 2024
- How to Print Your Social Media Memories - March 7, 2024
- How to Boost Sales with Social Media - August 1, 2023
- 5 Community Building WordPress Plugins - May 16, 2022
- 5 SEO Tips For Blogging And Content Creation - February 21, 2022
- Facebook Video Ads and Your Small Business: 6 Tips to Help You Win New Audiences - November 1, 2021
- Google and Data Security - September 23, 2021
Thanks for giving me the useful information. I think I need it. Thank you
These are all great tips for people starting a new business.
When a local music teacher fielded a group of the most talented vocalists, she was thrilled with the name “Beverly’s All Star Singers”. Somehow the acronym “Beverly’s A.S.S” made it past the printers, and 500 flyers were sent out to the community.
With the Internet, it’s even more complex. The first pornography site I ever visited was when I was 13 years old. I wasn’t looking for porn, instead I was trying to send a letter to Bill Clinton about how I thought he should handle negative press for civics class. Back then, Whitehouse.com was NOT a government website (It might not be today – I’m not going to check).
Great comment, Adam! Thanks so much for featuring my guest post as well! FYI Whitehouse.com is not a government site 🙂 (I clicked!)