Do It! Marketing Blog: Marketing for Smart People™

As a marketing speaker and marketing coach, clients often ask me for branding and naming advice to help create a great company name.

Names like...

• The Cookie Machine
• The Video Advisor
• CareerNavigator
• SalesGPS
• The Coffee Hangout
• Guitars After Dark
• The Fitness Foundry

I've seen solopreneurs and companies go through the branding/naming (or re-branding/re-naming) process smoothly and efficiently in less than a week - and I've also seen train wrecks that needlessly dragged on for months. 

How to get started

First, take a look at two blog posts to help you set the stage for an easy, effortless, enjoyable naming and branding process: 

Instant Branding Toolkit

Building Your Brand Sandwich

How not to screw it up

Here are some ideas to dig into for the "how" or "do's and don'ts" of the naming process...

1. At first, sit down with your leadership team. No spouses. No customers. No low-level employees. 5 people maximum.
2. Generate ideas for your raw branding/naming "building blocks" (as outlined in my "Instant Branding Toolkit" blog post)
3. Work over the list until you have 10 strong candidates.
4. Whittle the list down by eliminating 5 of them - the process is "1 vote to eliminate." If there are no objections from the rest of the group, it's gone. If there are objections, then it is up to those individuals to argue the case for "saving" that name until the vote is unanimous either way. This voting/defending process makes things go MUCH faster. And it gets you to focus on much stronger names faster. 
5. With your top 5 candidates, do a customer survey. Not your spouse, your brother-in-law, your Uncle Marvin who used to be an ad agency exec, not your sister who is a brand manager for Tide. Actual, real, live customers. 
6. Take the top 2 scoring names from the customer survey and do an in-house survey with your own team. Use ONLY customer-facing executives. Sales reps are great. Customer service people are great. Field service people are great. Ask them two simple questions: 1. "Given what you know of our customers and prospects, which one of these two names will resonate with them the most?" 2. "Why?" 
7. Compile your results, make your decision, announce your winner, and start your transition to your new name. 

Boom - done!

As a marketing speaker and marketing strategist, clients regularly ask me about the topic of company naming. And, naturally, people would like some free ideas for company naming, so for those folks, you can pop right over to this post. 

I'll wait... 

Oh, good - you're back!

The next question they ask is, "David, you've got a great company name in DO IT Marketing  (alternatively spelled DOIT Marketing or doitmarketing which is not correct but that's OK - you're cool)... how did that name come to be? 

Well... here's a confession. I'm sort of a company name change freak. Or I was very confused as a young child. Or I get bored easily.

Since 2001, when I started my entrepreneurial adventure, I've changed my branding more than is wise. Before DOIT Marketing, the company was known as UNCONSULTING. 

When I changed to that name, I took the opportunity to poke some fun at myself. After announcing the change to my email subscribers and all my current and past clients, I "hacked" my own website and replaced the content with some BIG graphical billboards.

These made it look like some goon squad named UNCONSULTING had replaced all the blah-blah-blah marketing copy that you typically find on most marketing firms' websites with a wild-eyed manifesto for marketing revolutionaries. 

Here is just one of about six that I created before the launch of DOIT Marketing: 

People LOVED it. It was contrarian, startling, and funny.

A current example of this is the good people over at www.shitcreekconsulting.com. Also, very funny - and people share that link and tell their friends and colleagues. 

The problem is - people can't tell if it's a gag or a real consulting firm... 

Bummer. 

So they don't buy...

BIGGER bummer. 

And that was the same problem I had with UNCONSULTING. People chuckled - but they had no idea what the hell it was or why they needed it. And the clue was - they didn't need it. Why? Because I was articulating what I was the OPPOSITE of - like the Uncola - not what I was. 

So we changed it to DOIT Marketing almost 5 years ago and the difference has been profound. 

It says what it is - Marketing. 

It gives you a feeling - action, movement, and getting things DONE.

And it's a handy acronym for a small business marketing philosophy that is systematic, approachable and repeatable:

DOIT Marketing means Define - Organize - Implement - Track. 

There's even a handy dandy visual with a clear explanation of these four phases right on the DOIT Marketing professional services page here. 

So the next time YOU are faced with (re-)naming your company, your products, your services or your brands, don't be clever - be smart!

What do YOU think? 

Use the COMMENTS area below to share your advice, insights and experiences on this topic...

She asked me what I thought of that name.

I told her - we gotta be careful.

The name is not going to stand on its own - it's going to become your methodology, your approach, your brand, and the umbrella that spans all of your offerings.

Soooo.... make sure you love all of the following, too... (Go ahead and plug in YOUR brand or YOUR words that articulate your fabulousness below):

• Responsible Leadership Assessment
• Responsible Leadership Retreats
• Responsible Leadership Survey
• Responsible Leadership Seminar
• Responsible Leadership Training
• Responsible Leadership Coaching
• Responsible Leadership IQ
• Responsible Leadership Conference
• Responsible Leadership News
• Responsible Leadership Blog
• Responsible Leadership Ezine
• Responsible Leadership Summit
• Responsible Leadership Tools
• Responsible Leadership Certification
• Responsible Leadership - the book
• Responsible Leadership - the keynote
• Responsible Leadership - the MBA guest lecture
• Responsible Leadership - the podcast
• Responsible Leadership - the PBS Special
• Responsible Leadership - the video series
• Responsible Leadership - the E-learning course
• Responsible Leadership - the 6-month leadership development course
  
• ... and so on!

So naming your company is no joke. And I'm not just saying that because I'm a marketing speaker and marketing coach and do this work all day long for a living! It really is a BIG, far-reaching decision.

You want everything to line up under your brand so you get a self-reinforcing marketing system where all the pieces "fit and click" - or in sales-speak, so you have plenty of opportunities for cross-selling, up-selling, and cross-pollination.

You want to own the "thought leadership platform" around your name and your offerings.

Question: How does YOUR professional services empire stack up?

Please leave a comment below and let us know!!