Introduction
“I heard you’ve got a new business, congrats! What’s it called?”
This happens to almost any new business owner as people are curious to hear about the brand name after hearing about what your business does.
Whenever someone asks you about the name of your new business, a cool and out of the box name can make a lasting impression. Additionally, coming up with a brand name is one of the most important decisions for a founder. That’s not all, the brand name also helps guide the company’s promotion and branding strategy.
Here are some qualities that should be in a brand name:
- Catchy, to grab attention instantly
- Memorable, Easy to remember
- Short, shorter names are easy to pronounce and remember.
- A minor reflection of your products or services (optional)
- Most importantly, Unique
These qualities make a good impact as always and should be followed whenever someone is starting a new venture.
That might be hectic for a while as it takes some steps and brainstorming and if you’re already filled with a lot of other stuff in your brain then maybe the moment you’re planning with brainstorming, your brain is at rest mode. So, let’s make a churn and burn, easy way to come up with a great, catchy, memorable & short brand name.
Because coming up with a solid brand name is difficult when you have tons of other things to get done, here is a step-by-step process to coming up with a product or brand name that leaves a lasting impression on your customers.
Before that, if you’re into a new business, best of luck from our team!
Table of Contents
- Introduction
- How to Come Up With Unique Business Name Ideas?
- Scenario / Example:
- Important Notice:
- Synonyms – Related Words
- Acronym
- Mashup
- Misspell
- Symbol (+ Word)
- Removing/Adding extra letters
- Words from Dictionary
- Relevant-Relatives words Combination
- Hybrid – Half Business Related Word + Half General Word
- Repeat First few Letters in Inverse
- Prefix and Suffix
- Other Methods:
- Here are the Names We Got Using Above Methods:
- How Well Known Companies come up with a Brand Name?
- Tools to Auto-Generate Name Ideas
- Wrapping up
How to Come Up With Unique Business Name Ideas?
There are going to be a few methods and ways with tools that can help in this case.
Scenario / Example:
Let’s consider two businesses – a mobile app development services company, and socks manufacturing business. Let’s walk through one process to come up with business name ideas both of these businesses.
Important Notice:
I will restrict myself to a few terms that I will select to go along with, to make things simple and get the point across. However, I suggest you select at least 10 terms or words that reflect and define your business and its value proposition for a good result.
I will attempt to make names based on my selected words and terms only, instead of moving in a random direction. Once you have a list of brand name ideas, then you can play around and creatively find one what works best.
And last but not least, I will be only giving a few brand names as an example to each method whereas there can be many. Hope it goes well. Let’s get started!
Synonyms – Related Words
How does it work?
Here we find synonyms for the business, but what word should we use as a starting point?
Let’s define words or terms that are very relevant to the two businesses.
Application & Development
and
Socks & Feet
These are my starting terms and words. Let’s look for synonyms related to these terms. You can google ”application or development synonyms” or go to Thesaurus.com, paste the word and see if you get something useful.
With a quick search on Google, here are some words that I found and make sense to me:
- Evolution (Development)
- Buildup (Development)
- Headway (Development)
- Praxis (Application)
and
- Hosiery (socks)
- Anklet (socks)
- Heel (socks)
I can combine my original and synonym words from here to come up with the first layer of ideas.
Service:
- Praxis
- Headway
- PraxisHeadway
- AppEvolution
- AppBuildup
Product:
- HosierySocks
- AnkleSock
- SocksFeet
- SocksHeel
- FeetHeel
Acronym
How does it work?
Suppose we want to explore acronym of our terms that define our businesses, the Mobile App Development Services Company and the American Socks Manufacturing Company. You can come up with any words that describe what your business does. Or, you could use other inspirations like names, locations, etc.
Service:
- MADCAS – Mobile App Development Company and Services
- CAD – Company of App Development
Product:
- SMC – Socks Manufacturing Company.
- ASMC – American Socks Manufacturing Company
Real Life Examples:
- IKEA
- DKNY
- AOL
- BBC
Easy, right?
Mashup
How does it work?
This is also easy as straightforward, all you need are two words that capture the essence of your company, and mix them, wholly or half. I have App Development and Socks for Winter.
Service:
- Develapp
- AppDev
- AppD
- DApp
Product:
- Sowin’
- Socker
- Wiso
- WintS
- WinSocks
Real Life Examples:
- Compaq
- Groupon
Misspell
How does it work?
We make a list of terms relevant to our company and add an artistic misspelling. A downside is that people used to consider this a spelling mistake, but with Foundr, Quora, Flickr and others, trends are now changing. Misspelling within limits and to some extent might help make a generic word memorable. Let’s go with App Development and Socks for Winter and see what we come up with.
Service:
- AppDew
- Develup
- Aqp
- Appy
- AppDo
- UppDev
Product:
- Sockr
- Wintr
- Socka
- Sockz
eal Life Examples:
- Flickr
- Foundr
- Tumblr
Symbol (+ Word)
How does it work?
There are hundreds of symbols and not just in mathematics alone; symbols can be found in different fields and subjects. You can simply google symbols lists with names or something like that, and you will get many. I liked a few so mentioning them below. Same as above, we’ve got the same words relevant to the business terms.
Service:
- DeltaMobi
- DevArc
- AppPhi
Product:
- NablaPhi
- SocksLine
- SocksRay
Removing/Adding extra letters
How does it work?
Again, we know our words and what we have to do is add or remove any extra letter from our words. It somehow resembles the above method of misspell but a slight difference is, in removing and adding additional letter should not make a name with the feeling that it is misspelled, but a letter is added or removed, in simple words we’re not allowed to give wrong spelling to the exact words but we can remove or add letters. Our terms here are Mobile Application Development Company and Winter Socks Manufacturing Company.
Service:
- Appa (A is added)
- Mobileapp (lication is removed)
- Mobilee (E is added)
Product:
- SocksMan ( ufacturing is removed)
- Cosocks (mpany is removed)
- Manco (ufacturing is removed, C and O from company are added)
- Wocks (W is added from Winter and S is removed from socks)
- WinTocks (ter is removed from winter and S from socks)
Words from Dictionary
How does it work?
We just need to read a lot of words from the dictionary and see if we can come up with any name for our business. There are a lot of words there and we have to select a word that slightly relevant or reflect our company. I’m only choosing words starting from B, C and D. Here the words will be general and not moving around our selected words but as I’m strictly bond to show examples around our chosen words, so I am listing both versions. But I will prefer to go with general words without using selected terms.
Service:
- Devbawbee / Bawbee (Scottish a coin of low value)
- BingleDev / Bingle (Austral. informal a collision)
- AppEdge / Bleeding Edge (the very forefront of technological development)
- DevColporteur / Colporteur (a person who peddles books, newspapers, or other writings, especially bibles and religious tracts)
Product:
- ConcinnitySocks / Concinnity (elegance or neatness of literary or artistic style)
- CouthySocks / Couthy (Scottish (of a person) warm and friendly; (of a place) cosy and comfortable)
- CrottleSocks / Crottle ( a lichen used in Scotland to make a brownish dye for wool)
- CudbearSocks / Cudbear (a purple or violet powder used for dyeing, made from lichen)
- DeasilSocks / Deasil (clockwise or in the direction of the sun’s course)
Real Life Examples:
- Apple
- Majestic
- Canon
Relevant-Relatives words Combination
How does it work?
Our business is about Mobile App Dev and Socks for Winter, so who develop an app? Developer, What it relates to? Tech, What it does? Run on Mobile and why we use socks? To stay warm, What it is made up of? Thread, Who wears it? Human, When we wear it? In winter.
Service:
- TechRun
- RunTech
- MobDev
- DevRun
Product:
- WarmThread
- WinterHuman
- WarmWinter
- WinterWarm
- WinterThread
Hybrid – Half Business Related Word + Half General Word
How does it work?
Alright, this is a straightforward way because what you need is one word relevant to your business and one general word. I personally use adjectives or a noun as a general word but you can try anything. My two business-related words are App and Socks and let me add general words with them to see how it comes up.
Service:
- AppDream
- AppJunction
- AppLope
- AppDash
- AppWin
- AppGo
- AppZone
- AppShed
Product:
- SocksDude
- DeepSocks
- SocksGenie
- SockLevel
- SocksTouch
- SocksMine
Real Life Examples:
- PayPal (pal means friend)
- GoDaddy
- IPhone
Repeat First few Letters in Inverse
How does it work?
In this method, we’ll select the first two or three letters of our defined terms and then add those first letters with our selected first letters but in inverse format. Our words are Application, Development, Socks and Winter. Now, let’s try this.
Service:
- AppA (Ap are first two words and added in inverse from right to left)
- DevveD (Dev are first three letters and added in inverse from right to left)
Product:
- SooS (So are first two letters)
- Soccos (Socs are first three letters)
- Winniw (Win are first three letters)
Real Life Examples:
- OPPO
Prefix and Suffix
How does it work?
This is also a very simple method which involves prefix and suffix. Come up with words and find prefix and suffix list then try adding into your selected words and see what sounds better. Let’s do it with App and Socks.
Service:
- Appify (-ify is suffix)
- Appism (-ism is suffix)
- UnApp (-un is prefix)
- TransApp (trans- is prefix)
Product:
- Socksly (-ly is suffix)
- Sockistic (-istic is suffix)
- Insocks (in- is prefix)
- UltraSocks (ultra- is prefix)
Real Life Examples:
- Weebly
- Grammarly
Other Methods:
- Ask employees, friends & relatives for a name suggestion
- Look for a place name on the map as Amazon, Adobe and Fuji did.
- Use your name, your kids, or your loved one’s name as Danone and Mercedes did.
- Use the most important memory by describing it in a single word
- Use what you believe by describing it in a single word
- Look for historical or mythical places, character names or objects and use them as your brand name as Asus, Nike, and Starbucks did.
Here are the Names We Got Using Above Methods:
Now I have a long list of name ideas and hopefully, I can select one I like from them. While I did not mix up any two methods and used only the defined terms, you’re free to mix and match different methods at once and play around with multiple terms. Let’s see once more what we’ve got so far.
Service:
- Praxis
- Headway
- PraxisHeadway
- AppEvolution
- AppBuildup
- MADCAS
- CAD
- AppDevel
- AppDeve
- AppD
- DApp
- AppDew
- AppDem
- Appo
- Appy
- AppoDo
- AppDo
- AppDi
- UppDev
- DeltaMobi
- DevArc
- AppPhi
- Appobile
- Pobile
- Appa
- Appile
- Mobileap
- Bileap
- Mobilee
- Devbawbee / Bawbee
- BingleDev / Bingle
- AppEdge / Bleeding Edge
- DevColporteur / Colporteur
- TechRun
- RunTech
- MobDev
- DevRun
- AppDream
- AppJunction
- AppLope
- AppDash
- AppWin
- AppGo
- AppZone
- AppShed
- AppA
- DevveD
- Appyfy
- Appism
- UnApp
- TransApp
Product:
- HosierySocks
- Sockankle
- SocksFeet
- SocksHeel
- FeetHeel
- SMC
- SMAC
- SoWin
- SockWi
- Wiso
- WintS
- WinSoc
- Sooks
- Soocks
- Sockr
- Sycks
- Wintr
- Socka
- Socky
- NablaPhi
- SocksLine
- SocksRay
- SocksMan
- Cosocks
- Macu
- Wocks
- WinTocks
- ConcinnitySocks / Concinnity
- CouthySocks / Couthy
- CrottleSocks / Crottle
- CudbearSocks / Cudbear
- DeasilSocks / Deasil
- WarmThread
- WinterHuman
- WarmWinter
- WinterWarm
- WinterThread
- SocksDude
- SocksDeep
- SocksGenie
- SockLevel
- SocksTouch
- SocksMine
- SooS
- Soccos
- Winniw
- Socksly
- Sockistic
- Insocks
- UltraSocks
How Well Known Companies come up with a Brand Name?
- ASUS (from the mythical winged horse Pegasus)
- Nike (the goddess of Victory).
- Samsonite (from the Bible character Samson)
- Starbucks (from Starbuck, the young chief mate of the Pequod, in Moby Dick)
- Audi (the Latin translation of the German name “Horch”)
- Altavista (Spanish for “high view”)
- Daewoo (“great house” in Korean).
- Acer (Latin for “sharp”, “able”)
- Volvo (Latin for “I roll”)
- Cisco from San Francisco, where the company was founded.
- Reebok is an alternate spelling of “rhebok”, an African antelope.
- Quora is a fake plural of the latin quorum (public assembly).
- 7-Eleven, it’s open from seven in the morning to eleven at the night, every day.
- Pixar is a combination of the word pixel and the initials of one of its founders, Alvy Ray Smith
- Mercedes (named after the daughter of one of the founders)
- Danone (named after the founder’s son’s childhood nickname)
- Adobe (after the Adobe Creek, running close to the founder’s house)
- Amazon (named after the largest river in the world, by volume of water)
- Fuji (named after the highest mountain in Japan
- Compaq (from “computer” and “pack”)
- Evernote (from “forever” and “note”)
- Groupon (from “group” and “coupon”)
- Lego (from the Danish “leg godt”, which means to “play well”).
- AOL (America Online)
- BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation)
- BENQ (Bringing Enjoyment and Quality to life)
-
Tools to Auto-Generate Name Ideas
Here is the list of some awesome tools that can help you in auto-generating brand name ideas for your business or startups that you’re going to start or maybe doing for someone else who asked you for the favor in suggesting him/her the name.
That’s fair enough, here the task is same to come up with some words relevant to your business and copy-paste words one by one and hit search option in the following tools below to see the magic.
- NameMesh.com
- LeanDomainSearch.com
- Shopify’s business name generator
- Namelix.com
- Oberlo’s business name generator
- Wordoid.com
- Dotomator.com
- NameStation.com
- DomainHole.com
- Bustaname.com
- Domainr.com
- Impossibility.org
Wrapping up
See, That’s easy to do so. You’ve just got an idea of how to do the brainstorming thing to generate some cool names. But what it will make the best part? If you use your creativity and I’m sure you’re more creative than me (wink wink).
I’m just hoping that you’re at the stage where you are no more worried about business name ideas and how to come up with a cool brand name. Get it like mud in hands and avoid sands. Hope it helps and you’ve enjoyed the guide throughout.
Know a friend who’s looking for a brand name idea for his startup or business? Share with them and also let us know in the comments section which two names from service and product you like the most and share your thoughts and feedback.
Happy, Happy Business 🙂
