Deciding On A Business Name
Starting A New Business: The Ultimate Guide
Chapter 3: Deciding On a Business Name
Table of Contents
Deciding on your Business Name
You probably have an idea what a business called ‘Bills Vegan Burgers’ does. Sure, you might not immediately know whether they are a wholesalers, a fast food restaurant or a range of products, but the name gets you to the right zone.
Conversely, if you name your company ‘Red Vex’, people aren’t likely to get what you do. That might be fine if you have a huge marketing budget and plan to build a brand, but for most people, it makes sense for your company name to have something to do with your product or service.
Let’s start by looking at what you must do, then we’ll look at your discretionary choices.
Where are Business Names Registered?
If you are creating a limited liability company, you must set a name for it and register it with Companies House. If you plan to be a sole trader or partnership, the rules are slightly different as you’ll effectively be yourself trading under whatever name you choose.
If you’re wondering where to check business names, then this can also be done at Companies House, and it’s a very sensible thing to do before you become too wedded to a particular company name.
On the Companies House site you’ll find where to check registered business names that have already been taken by other companies. Upon using their site you’ll understand how to check business names available any time you need to in the future.
Can Business Names be Similar & can Business Names be the Same?
The short answer is no and no.
To avoid mix ups between companies and to prevent companies pretending to be a legal entity they are not, Companies House will not let you create a business name that is considered the ‘same as’ another. ‘Same as’ does actually have to be exactly like for like. Let’s imagine a business called ‘Services Plus’ and you attempt to register a company called ‘Service +’- it’s going to be rejected on the basis that it is the same as the first version.
The Companies House website does a pretty good job of telling you this right away so you don’t get too excited about your possible new name.
Similar business names are where there may be a play on words – there could be an existing business called ‘Easy Cleaning Services.’ If you then attempt to register ‘EZ cleaning services’, it may slip through at first, but you run the risk of Companies House contacting instructing you to change the business name.
How to Come up with a Business Name?
One quick way to get some inspiration is to use one of the many online business name generators out there. We like this one. You can pop in a few keywords and the industry and it will return a few names. You might not settle on one of these, but it can help to get the conversation started.
You want your business name to scale as your business grows. Try to avoid limiting yourself at such an early stage in your journey. Going back to our example of Bill’s Vegan Burgers, what happens when his tasty offering becomes so successful that he branches out into vegan sausages and vegan ice cream, or even a whole range of hot meals.
Time is your friend at this early stage. Establishing a good name for a business may take you through several iterations. And that’s fine! You don’t need to settle on the final name until you actually register your company and you don’t need to do that until you are almost ready to start trading.
Use a structured brainstorming session with people you trust – you could use friends to get feedback on a shortlist of business names.
You can download our business name brainstorming template to help give you a process to use for settling on the name.
You’ll want to consider:
Your Brand Values, Ethos and Offering
Your business name should be aligned with what your business does. When looking for a window cleaning service, your eyes will gravitate towards the companies with window cleaning in their name over the companies with terms like ‘domestic maintenance’ in their name. They might do the same thing. The latter company might do a better job than the former, but business names that can attract customers are more likely to have a clear link between who they are and what they do.
The Website
Along with checking if the company name is available at Companies House, you need to check that the domain name is available. You can use godaddy or 123 reg for this sort of thing.
Why does this matter? Because your website is going to be the shop window that potential customers view you offering through. If a competitor has a very similar sounding website, then this could be a reason to look again at your name.
There’s a school of thought that says if you can’t get the .com address, then you should move on. And certainly in the past, that held true. However, with the changes to the range of domain name end points, there are lots of good reasons to look at a domain that tells more of your story. Go Impartial has a .uk ending, because our services are aimed exclusively at the UK. You could explore a .ltd ending or a .uk too. It’s worth noting that there are no detrimental SEO impacts of having a domain name that ends in something other than .com
The Earworm
You know when you hear a catchy tune and can’t get it out of your head all day? Well there can be a similar principle for company names. A University of Alberta study back in 2010 concluded that people had a more positive impression of companies with a name which had repetitive sound in it – think ‘Kit Kat’, ‘GoPro,’ ‘Jelly Belly.’
If your company name has something catchy about it, people are more likely to remember it.
Logo Design
It might be too early in your journey to be thinking about company branding, colour schemes and logos, but keep in mind that your business name and logo are a bit like housemates, they are going to be in the same space for a lot of their time, regardless of how well they get along.
You might decide to turn your business name into part of the logo, or have a separate image that needs to look great next to your business name. Give it some thought.
Avoid Using your Own Name
There are some exceptions to this rule – many accountants for example will have grown into large practises and have been named after the founding partner.
However, as a general rule, including your own name in the company name blurs the line between who you are and what your business does.
You might find it harder to scale up with a name that crosses over. And whilst having your own name in the business can convey ‘personal,’ it can also be a message of lack of size which could be off putting to some customers.
Don’t Make your Customer’s Life Hard
Have you ever heard an advert for something on the radio or website that they want you to visit that has an awkward spelling, or is difficult to remember? Why create additional friction for your customers. Keep the spelling simple and make it easy for your customers to remember.
You are also limited to using certain characters in your company, so if you’re wondering if business names have special characters, the answer is – not really.
The list below shows the range of characters you can include.
- A-Z (any standard letter)
- 0-9 (any standard numeric)
- & (ampersand)
- @ (at sign)
- £ (pound sign)
- $ (dollar sign)
- € (euro sign)
- ¥ (yen sign)
- # (hash tag)
- . (full stop)
- , (comma)
- : (colon)
- ; (semi-colon)
- – (hyphen)
Build on your Market Research
In chapter 2 we looked at how to come up with your business idea and research it’s viability. You hopefully have an idea about your unique selling points, try out some company names that fuse together your value proposition into the name.
There’s no silver bullet for selecting your company name. You’ll want it to be meaningful, stand out from the crowd and be able to grow with your business.
It will never be 100% right as you’ll inevitably have more than one possible option that you have to reduce down to the final choice. There’s a story about how someone thought that Go Impartial was a dating site for accountants, rather than a service for connecting businesses with new accountancy services. We chuckled about it, but it does highlight how different people can take different meanings from your business name.
Seek Feedback
Once you’ve got a shortlist of business names, get some feedback from people you know and those you don’t. Ask them to give you unvarnished thoughts and get them to be brutally honest. Remember, this is an exercise in producing the best company name you can. So, remove any ego or personal pride in it. You might think you have the best name available, but if lots of other people see it differently, take it on the chin and move on.
During our market research, if lots of people had thought we sounded like a dating site for accountants, you can be sure we’d be a differently named website right now!
Once you’ve settled on your business name, it’s time to register your company, which can be done via the Companies House.
Your business is now forming its own identity and you should be very proud.
Key Takeaways:
- Use the Companies House business name checker to avoid names that are identical or too similar to existing businesses.
- Make your business name simple to remember and spell.
- With a small list of exceptions, you can’t use special characters in your business name. No emojis!
- Check there’s a suitable domain name for your chosen company name.
- Remember there is no SEO penalty for having something other than a .com.
- Consider your logo and how it will match your company name.
- Reflect on your brand values, ethos and vision when creating your company name.
- Build on your market research and unique selling points.
- Recognise there will be more than one good option for your company name.
- Seek objective feedback about your company name.
Now you have your business name and a business idea that will take the world by storm, you need to think about creating your business model and ensuring it scales. And that’s what we’ll cover in Chapter 4.
