You have your business idea in mind, know exactly what products or services you are going to offer, and have defined your business plan. However, you get stuck with one of the essential aspects: your company name. If you find yourself in that situation, you are not the only person it happens to. We describe in this article how you create business name generators for your company.
Finding a name for a business is not always easy, and that is why there are business name generators that make the task easier.
The company name plays a strategic role for obvious reasons. From the beginning, people will use it to refer to your business and remember it. In addition, it is an almost final decision. It is possible to change it afterwards, as Facebook has done by becoming Meta. Still, a company name change consumes considerable resources and must be very rare.
Therefore, the company name should not be decided lightly. It is worth studying different possibilities and testing to see which works best. In this article, we will look at five of the best business name generators on the market. Below, we’ll review best practices for using these tools and choosing a suitable business name.
Top 5 Business Name Generators
Business name generators are virtual tools that help you brainstorm ideas for a suitable name. They are free and can be used quite quickly and intuitively. Most of them are optimized for e-commerce, although businesses can use them. These are the five most prominent generators on the market today:
Shopify Company Name Generator
Shopify’s business name generator is one of the most comprehensive for eCommerce businesses. Shopify is one of the leading platforms for building eCommerce websites, and you can find out more about it in our review. Name Generator is a separate tool from Shopify that you can use for free, even if you don’t have a subscription.
The principle is quite simple: you must enter a keyword that describes the activity of your company or another term you want to use as a reference (without accents), for example, Children’s fashion. Next, the Shopify generator offers a list of approximately one hundred name possibilities. In all of them, the keyword you initially entered will be integrated (for example, Fire Children’s Fashion ). Still, you will decide if you finally use it as part of the official company name or not.
Tiendanube company name generator
Tiendanube is one of the leading e-commerce platforms in Latin America. Like Shopify, it offers a free standalone business name generator. First, you must choose a category or item for your business.
Next, you must enter a keyword that cannot be missing from the name and click on «Create combinations». Then, Tiendanube’s generator returns a list of name suggestions with the indicated word.
Attention: CloudStore suggestions are displayed in groups of 20, and there is no possibility of returning. You’ll have to repeat the search if you want to refer back to the names you’ve already passed.
Business Name Generator
Business Name Generator (BNG) is a free business name generator with a built-in domain checker. It is sponsored by Wix, one of the market’s most prominent eCommerce builder platforms. This article looks at Wix’s features for creating an eCommerce website.
BNG has the usual behaviour of these tools: you enter one or several keywords, and the device returns a very extensive brainstorm with hundreds of possible names. It is available in Spanish and offers optimized names in Spanish. Suggested titles include only one of the keywords you used for your search.
In our example, we are looking for ideas for a winter sports company (which should include no prepositions or secondary words ). Some suggested names include “Sports” and others “Winter,” but the two terms never appear together. In filters, you can indicate whether you prefer the keyword to appear at the beginning of the end of the name. When you click on the “+” sign next to a character that interests you, a list shows the availability of the domains associated with that name.
In the top right corner menu, BNG has variants you may be interested in name generators for blogs, podcasts, brands, startups, etc.
Nameshack
Nameshack is a free business name generator that also reports domain availability. To use it, you must enter one or more keywords and choose a category for your business. Nameshack then returns a list of suggested names. Each of them indicates if the corresponding “.com” domain is available and links a tool to generate a logo with that name.
One drawback of Nameshack is that it is not fully optimized for Spanish. You will have to be prepared to come across quite a few names in English or French, but you never know where good inspiration might come from. Always remember that these generators fulfil the brainstorming function: you can take or modify what you want.
Neelix
Neelix is a free business name generator that stands out for the quality of the filters it offers. It differs from other generators in the intermediate steps after entering the keywords: you must choose the length and style of the names to refine the selection. You can select names for brands, personal names, actual words (in English), words that rhyme, etc.
Neelix is also original when displaying the results: the names come with their logo proposal (which can be free or paid). It also indicates whether the domains linked to the proposed terms are available.
Good practices for choosing your company name
The company name generators in the previous section are a brainstorming tool. To use them well, they need to be part of a more extensive creative process that allows you to select the best names and test them before settling on one. Next, we will share a series of good practices that you must follow to choose your company’s name.
Start with a generic brainstorm.
All business name generators use one or more keywords as a starting point, but who said that the terms entered have to be the name of the product you are selling? Don’t rush to join the most apparent keyword and find the word the first time. The initial brainstorming aims to identify the values and emotions that define your company. What adjectives, feelings or slogans can you associate them with? Do they give you some clues to guide your search?
In this preliminary brainstorming, you should also not forget about your competitors or other companies that serve as inspiration for your business. Look at their names and try to recognize their strengths and weaknesses.
Avoid generic and limiting terms.
A good company name should position your business in the market. People who read or listen to it should easily link it to the activity and values of your company. However, to achieve these goals, three temptations should generally avoid:
- Include terms that are too generic such as “business” or “global”, and empty words that do not add much.
- Mention the products you sell too explicitly. For example, if your company is called Queens Baby Clothes, you would have a more challenging time if you want to expand your market to children over two years old in the future. Instead, including a generic word that identifies your sector, such as “fashion” or “decoration”, can be beneficial for SEO positioning.
- Include your local target market in the name. If you call your company Plumbing Madrid, you would have enough difficulties positioning yourself outside the Spanish capital, and it is not convenient to close doors in the future, right? The situation is different when a geographical location is part of the corporate identity of your business. For example, the company Gastronomic Spain sells typical Spanish foods in Europe. In this case, including the geographical toponym in the name helps the position.
Choose a name that is easy to remember and write.
When screening names, remember that simplicity is your great ally. Let’s look at the terms of big brands like Instagram, Uber, and Airbnb… We can identify that they are all characterized by their simplicity and being easy to remember, right?
Prospects mustn’t have to go to any lengths to memorize your company’s name or even write it down. Complicated spelling could make your brand harder to find on search engines like Google.
Check domain availability as soon as possible.
It is an important reminder: don’t leave web domain verification to the last minute. Imagine that you have a good name, you have done tests, you see that it is influential among your target audience, and, at the last moment, you find that the main web domains linked to that name are unavailable.
For this reason, many business name generators in the previous section have a built-in domain checker. You can also use specialized pages like GoDaddy, Nominal …
Check the availability of the name in the business register.
A second check that should also not be delayed is the registration of trademarks and patents to check if another company is already using that name. A simple Google search will give you plenty of clues. Still, it’s possible that some dormant company registered the name years ago or that some brand without a virtual presence is using it.
Trademark registration depends on each country. These are some pages where you can consult in the Spanish-speaking world:
- Spanish Patent and Trademark Office (SPTO) (includes all trademarks registered in the European Union)
- National Institute of Industrial Property of Argentina
- Mexican Institute of Industrial Property
- National Institute of Industrial Property of Chile
Checking availability is not just a legal matter. Suppose the name you have chosen is too similar to that of another company or lacks originality compared to existing ones. In that case, the consequences will not be beneficial for your brand’s positioning.
Test the company name among your target audience
The company name is part of the market study, so testing it before making it final is a necessary step. Try to gather a sample of people who are part of your target audience and collect their impressions.
A /B testing is a method used to evaluate creative ideas. If you already have a mailing list, you can use a person’s name as the sender and include two possible company or brand names in the email subject line to see which one generates the most opens and clicks. However, an A/B test is efficient for defining a new brand’s name or an existing company’s subdivision. If you are starting a new business, you may want to use other methods to choose a definitive name and then focus your marketing efforts on positioning it.
Conclusion
Communication with your contacts and customers will revolve around your company name. You will use it to present your business on your posters, newsletters, and social networks… Rushing will never be an excellent adviser to select it. Choosing a good name is part of market research, and the time and resources invested are an investment for the future.
The business name generators we present in this article may help you brainstorm. Still, the main component of creativity is yours and your team. What is the name that “clicks” in your head when you hear it?