How to come up with a good company or product name

There are few tricks I picked up over time on company and product naming that I would like to share.

1.) Pick a name with “verb potential” Checking your company name idea can complete this phrase “_______ it” as in “Google it”, “TitanFile it”, “Mobify it”

2.) Always go for .com unless you rely only on search engies to bring in the bacon. When you tell people the name of your company they will by default associate it with .com. So if you run CoolCompany.net, people will remember the CoolCompany part, go home and sure enough, type in CoolCompany.com in your browser. The only worse thing is if there actually is CoolCompany.com that is in the same business as you. If there is, they should send you a “thank you” note for driving business to them.

3.) If you can, pick one word. Chances are all of these would be taken and you will need to either purchase a domain name (and any rights associated with it) or come up with a new word. You can pick a word from a foreign language (aside from picking a word that sounds cool, make sure that you know the meaning of the same and that it is not offensive in native language) or you can make up a new word. Some examples are “Aberee”,”Helpioso”, “Medioso” itd. Another trick is to use “slightly” misspelled words such as “Meester”, “Taytan” etc.

4.) If you cannot come up with one word — use two, but in this case make them relevant to what you do. Examples “HealthRecord”,”FastCompany”,”MetalWorks” etc. Using more than two words makes it hard to remember and long to spell and type (hello mister johnatan@canadianentrereneurshipsupplies.com).

5.) To get some ideas and inspiration — use freely available tools! Some of my favorite free tools are nameboy.com and bustaname.com

6.) Avoid using numbers. 6rooms.com looks good on the screen but if someone hears the name of your company they will have no idea if they should use numerals (6rooms.com) or letters (sixrooms.com) to look you up!

7.) Finally, pick a name with initial character that is early in the alphabet. These companies will show up on top of the lists at trade-show exhibitor lists, directories, indexes etc. Avoid using X or Z as the first letter of your company or product name. If you hear “Xoom” do you think it’s spelled as “Zoom” or “Xoom”