Evan Carmichael breaks down four naming approaches: founder names like Harley-Davidson, invented words like Sony, memorable oddities like Xerox, and context-based names like Virgin. His main point: don't overthink it. Check domain availability, then focus on finding paying customers and validating your product. Customers care about value, not your brand label.
Chapters
Don't spend so much time worrying about what you're going to name your business and instead focus on building a successful foundation that can lead you to huge growth. Hi, I'm Evan Carmichael, your friend in all things entrepreneurship, and today I'm answering a question from one of my readers, Ajith, who's looking for a name for his business and wanted my help. There's a million different ways to go about this. If you look at any company and how they got started, how they found their name, you'll find a million different reasons. Some people name their company after themselves. So mine is EvanCarmichael.com. You can look at Harley-Davidson, who's after the two founders, Harley and Davidson. Ben Jerry's ice cream. Some companies are founded because they just make up a word. You know, some companies want a word that's easy to remember. You know, Sony was the combination of Sonos and Sunny Boy. And so that became Sony, a made-up word, but they wanted something that was easy to remember. Some people make names that are hard to remember, but they realize that once you remember it, you're never going to forget it. Xerox is an example of that. Some people come up with a name because of their situations. If you look at Virgin, they started because they were all virgins in business. There's a lot of different ways to come up with a name for your business. And you can look at any story again of any famous entrepreneur, how they got started and where the name came from. But I wouldn't worry so much about the name. Maybe at least find out that the domain name is available. That could be really important. But too often as entrepreneurs we get caught up in the admin and the minutiae of our business and we do the things that we like to do instead of the things that we have to do. Don't worry about the name. Go out and find a customer. Go out and find someone who's going to pay you for what you do. That's the most important first step, right? Doesn't matter what your name is. If people aren't going to be willing to pay you for your product or service, you don't have a company. So go out and find that customer. Network with them. They won't care what you call the business. You got to be proud of your company. And I'm not saying just pick a name from the air. But this should not be your top business priority. You might disagree with me. I'm open to hearing your feedback. Might be a little controversial, but for me, my opinion, I wouldn't worry so much about the name. And again, focus on the task. 1, 2, 3 most important things that you need to grow your business. Finding a company name is not going to be on the top of that list. Hopefully that helps. I'd love to hear what you guys have to think. Leave a comment, let me know. And if you like the video, please give it a thumbs up below. It always makes me happy when I see them come in and want to do more videos for you guys. I'll see you soon.
