Five Useful Tips to Choosing a Memorable Brand Name

Companies will need to have their own brand name that will serve as their unique identity. These brand names are considered more important than logos, which are usually the first images that consumers will see from a company, their product packaging designs, and even their advertisement tools. If a company chooses to have a wordmark or lettermark type of logo, then we can say that both the logo design and the brand name are important since they are being treated as one.

On this article, we will be discussing a few helpful tips that a starting company should consider when deciding for a name for their brand, and we hope that these five simple tips are enough to be able to help you out in creating your identity. If you want to know what these tips are, then scroll down and check them out yourself.

One: Availability of the Brand Name

The brand name is what carries the identity of a company or business and should always be unique and different from others. Just like logos, once a brand name is established for a certain company, it should be copyrighted and owned by that company to prevent others to use it. Using a brand name that is already owned by other companies may only result in getting you into trouble, which may become costly for your company since matters like these will almost always be settled in court, and you may have to pay a penalty for it.

So, before you can even start deciding on the name for your brand, you should always check whether the name you had in mind is already taken or not, and checking for the availability of brand or company names can be done in various ways. The fastest and easiest method is to use search engines such as Google to see to it if the brand name can still be used, but this method may not be too reliable at times. To be sure with this matter, and to really verify the availability of a brand name that you wish to use, there are many websites that provide this kind of service.

These websites are region specific—which means that some may work on certain countries but not on others—and because of this limitation, we will be unable to provide you with the exact websites that you can use. To help you out, you can search for these websites by entering “brand name availability checker” on search engines, and make sure to specify the region or country for a more accurate check on the brand name’s availability. We also have guidelines on logo designs, but we’ll get to that later, let’s focus now on the brand name first.

Two: Simple, Easy to Spell, and Pronounce

Once you have checked if a brand name is not yet being used by another company, the next question to ask yourself is, “Is the brand name easy to spell or pronounce?” If a brand name is easy to spell, then there is greater chance that it can also be easily remembered by the public. On another note, if a brand name is difficult to spell, it can still be easily remembered, though when people are asked about what it is, the answer will most likely be “the one that’s hard to spell.”

The brand name should also be easy to pronounce, and this is because of two reasons. One, when a brand name is easy to pronounce, it prevents the risk of mispronouncing the name that may mislead people to a different brand or something else that isn’t related. While there may be chances that a brand name may sound similar to another, but these are less likely to happen if you simply pronounce the brand name correctly. Therefore, the simpler the brand name, the easier it is to spell and to pronounce. So, if you want your brand name to get recognized by the general public, it is best to opt for an uncomplicated one for your company.

Three: Relevance of the Name to your Products/Services

Is your brand name relevant to the products and services that you are offering? If it is, then good. The reason behind this is that people can easily associate the products or services to the brand when they see it, or vice versa. A good example for this is the Coca-Cola food packaging design. When people see the brand name, they can already associate it with soda or beverage drinks because of the word cola in it. Another example is Microsoft Corporation, the “micro” and “soft” in the brand name can easily be associated with both microchips and software, respectively. So when people read the brand name Microsoft, the first thing that pops into their mind are computers and computer-related accessories.

While there may also be instances when a brand name is not related to the products and services that are being offered, one way to make this work is to add something at the end of the name that gives a reader an idea on the nature behind the business. An example that we can provide for this is Apple Inc., which at first glance may make you think that this company is about selling apples or any kind of fruit, when in fact, it is a computer company. To make this brand name work, especially when doing promotions or advertisements, Apple sometimes adds the word computers at the end that makes it into “Apple Computers,” and this brand name is a lot easier for people to understand as to what this company is all about.

Four: Considering the Logo as a Factor

Most, if not all the time, the brand name always comes first before the logo design, and this is because the brand name creates the overall identity of a business and the logo is only secondary. The best thing to do when starting a business is to have the brand name and the logo go hand in hand. When thinking of the brand name, you should also have the logo design pictured out in your mind if you have not made a draft of it yet. A brand name should always, and I do mean always, relate to the design of your logo, and this is very applicable if you choose to use the symbol or icon type of logo.

Visualizing the logo design in your mind can greatly aid you in thinking for a name of your brand. Why is that so? This is because when you see what you want, you can take notes based on the image you have in your head and play around with it until you can finally come up with a catchy name for your brand.

Five: Ask Assistance or Feedback from Fellow Employees

Then of course, “No man is an island,” you can never get things done without the help from others. Similar to running the company or business, you can never do it by yourself and you will need to ask for assistance from other people, making a logo or even deciding on the brand name will also need to be done by more than just one person. A company is being run by multiple people, and an effective leader should not take matters all to themselves, they should also get others—either superiors or subordinates—to be involved in the decision-making process if they want the company to grow and be successful.

Back to the naming of the brand, this should be done by more than just one person from start to finish. During the planning phase, other people should also be involved to be able to come up with a branding design in the most time-efficient way possible. And even after being able to come up with a brand illustration, you should also present it to others and ask for their feedback to be able to determine whether the majority of the employees are in favor of the brand name while also taking note of the minority’s opinions.

You see? Making an awesome branding design name is definitely no walk in the park. It requires careful planning and a few tips to be able to come up with a name that can easily be remembered, while also being able to stand the test of time. A reliable-sounding brand name may greatly help a company grow since people will most likely avail of the products and services of these brands. On the other hand, if a brand will sound questionable or shady, then consumers will most probably keep away from the products and services that they are offering.