The Startup Ideas Podcast
The ultimate startup naming guide (must watch for founders)
Wed, 02 Oct 2024
In this episode, we dive deep into my process for naming my startups and businesses. I share my 4-step guide for coming up with memorable names for startups and how you can apply these principles to come up with your own scroll stopping name. Timestamps: 00:00 Intro01:09 types of names01:53 Naming Strategy 1: Descriptive 03:11 Naming Strategy 2: Phrases 05:39 Naming Strategy 3: Funny08:17 Bad Name Examples12:19 Good Name Examples16:53 Tofu Name Examples18:10 Hack your way to a novel name20:25 Use AI for brainstorming22:22 Greg's personal name list1) 3 types of names:• Bad names• Good names• "Tofu" names (bland, forgettable)2) 3 winning name strategies:• Descriptive (e.g. @somewhereilive)• Phrases (e.g. Boss Babe)• Funny (e.g. You Probably Need a Haircut)3) Bad name examples:• WhatsApp (fails telephone test)• GameStop (negative connotation)• Google Bard (sounds like barf) 4) Good name examples:• Perplexity (matches brand promise)• Bump (action-oriented)• Autopilot (clear value prop)5) Hack your way to a novel name:• Create "Name Game" note on your phone• Jot down catchy words/phrases• Check handle availability bi-weekly• Test with friends/family• Create logo mockups6) Use AI for brainstorming:• Prompt Claude: "I'm brainstorming names around [your topic]. What are some interesting, clear, direct names that speak to this community?"7) Greg's personal name list sneak peek:• AfterParty• PrettyPerfect• InvitationOnly• InCred8) Pro tip: It's okay to have bad names on your list. Keep refining!9) Remember: A great name can be the difference between viral growth and crickets.Want more free ideas? I collect the best ideas from the pod and give them to you for free in a database. Most of them cost $0 to start (my fav)Get access: https://www.gregisenberg.com/30startupideas 🎯 To build your own portfolio businesses powered by community you might enjoy my membership.You'll get my full course with all my secrets on building businesses, peer-groups to keep you accountable, business ideas every single month and more!Spots are limited.https://www.communityempire.co/📬 Join my free newsletter to get weekly startup insights for free:https://www.gregisenberg.com/70,000+ people are already subscribed.To improve your rankings your business on Google and using AI for SEO, sign up tohttp://www.boringmarketing.com/FIND ME ON SOCIALX/Twitter: https://twitter.com/gregisenbergInstagram: https://instagram.com/gregisenberg/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gisenberg/
Okay, this is going to be a fun one. Today, I just need to get something off my chest. I think that the name of a startup is more important than ever. There's a lot of bad names out there. So I don't want you to be naming your startup something bad. I want you to name it something good. And why does it matter more than ever?
it's because you need a name that's going to be scroll stopping so in today's podcast i'm going to just walk you through how i think about names some of my frameworks and if you stick until the end i'll even tell you a few of some names that come from my list that you can have so this is going to be a tutorial on how to name your startup how to come up with a good name
I believe that there's three types of names. Bad names, good names, and what I call tofu names, which are kind of like mid names. So what I mean by that is it doesn't really stick out. You know, tofu takes on the sauce of whatever is around it. It's kind of bland. So it's kind of a bad name, but it's not, you know, it's not offensive. And I do have a framework for naming.
I took this from our membership community empire.co website. And there's three ways where you can actually, you know, I come up with names. So the first thing is I come up with a descriptive name, a phrase, or a funny name. And I'll explain exactly what I mean by each name. So a descriptive name is something like the Instagram account at somewhere I will live.
So if you go to that Instagram account, and we can put it up on the screen, I think it has millions of users or millions of followers. 838,000 followers. And what does it mean? When I quick follow, what am I getting? Well, I'm getting beautiful photos of somewhere I would live. So this is also a takeaway, which is the name of your startup could be the name of your handle.
Um, and you know, or it could not, and you could have a separate process for, uh, coming up with the name of your handle, but having almost a million people, uh, who are interested in somewhere I would live, you can sell them a lot of things. You can sell them real estate, you can sell them furniture, interior design services.
So I think that having a descriptive name, uh, is really important, um, nowadays and just works really well. Um, because, uh, people see it and they're like somewhere I would like to live. Yeah, I could use some, you know, furniture, interior house inspo in my Instagram. I'm a click follow. So descriptive names, super underrated, uh, and something I use a lot. Phrases.
So what do I mean by a phrase? So a phrase could be something that is starting to take off in the cultural zeitgeist. So a few years ago, I'll just pull up Google Trends, there was a popular term and is now less popular, but it was called boss babe. So as you can see on my screen, let's go to Max. And this is Google Trends.
And I use a tool called Glimpse to just give you some more information and just some related terms. So a friend of mine, I think it was around 2013, sort of picked up on this name Boss Babe. She grabbed the handle, created a meme page, theme page called Boss Babe on Instagram. And it just started to grow as... searches for Boss Babe grew.
And she started sharing, you know, quotes, you know, for female entrepreneurs and empowerment, female empowerment, and just really started to go up. And she created an account with millions and millions of followers. I think it's about 6 or so million followers and was able to create, you know, a five plus million dollar a year business on the back of it.
So a phrase, when a phrase starts being on the come up, you really do need to just take stock of it, see if you can grab that handle, see if you can buy that handle, create a business around it. I think phrases are underrated. I've had another, and he's actually been on the pod, I had a friend of mine who had a phrase that he owned called at the most famous artist. So he was an artist.
No one was sort of listening to him for a while. So he just decided to be called the most famous artist so that when you would Google him, he would come up. The most famous artist. Just Google him for a second. He's literally the number one person that comes up ahead of Pablo Picasso, ahead of Rembrandt, ahead of Leonardo da Vinci, Vincent Van Gogh, Salvador Dali, Michelangelo, these people.
He's the first person. His name is Matty Moe. And phrases, if you own a phrase, it's super, super valuable. And then there's humor. The internet... revolves around funny memes and stuff like that. So if you can pick a funny name, it will go far and you will get a lot of dividends of that. There's a lot of examples of that. I think the whole Manscaped brand, their content is...
Their social is a little bit around humor and stuff like that. I think they did a pretty good job at it and just leaning into it. Shh, don't tell anyone, but I've got 30 plus startup ideas that could make you millions. And I'm giving them away for free. These aren't just random guesses. They're validated concepts from entrepreneurs who've built $100 million plus businesses.
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So a funny name, I'll give you a couple of examples of what that could look like. When COVID happened and people couldn't get their haircuts, I actually, as a fun side project, 24 hours, I launched this thing called You Probably Need a Haircut. And it was basically a tool that connected barbers in Brooklyn to people who needed haircuts. Um, and they would like coach you on how to cut it yourself.
Um, and it was funny because obviously you needed a haircut, um, because, um, you know, it'd been a couple months and it got picked up by like good morning America and everywhere, millions and millions of visits to the website, um, all from making people laugh and smile. Um, and, And that was that was a really fun one. So and we actually use that same idea.
We created a sort of an AI automation business called You Probably Need a Robot, which is that same idea. And we've gotten free traffic the same way. So humor goes a long way. And these are like the three sort of ways to think about how I think about creating a name for the Internet. It's going to go super, super far.
And then I want to just show examples of what could good names be, what would bad names be, what would tofu names be. And then I'll talk more about hacking your way to a novel name. But let's go into some bad names. So I actually think WhatsApp is a garbage name.
It's a garbage name because, first of all, it's like when they were first starting and they were trying to get product market fit and it just basically didn't pass the telephone test. Now, what's the telephone test? It's when you call your friend and you're like, you need to download this app called WhatsApp.
And then they go to the app store and then they try to download it and they spell it wrong. WhatsApp, right? Right. Um, so, you know, passing the telephone test is pretty important, just easier. Um, obviously now it's a success. So it kind of doesn't, once you're like mega successful, it doesn't really matter what your name is, but it is probably one of the worst names.
Uh, GameStop is a pretty bad, uh, GameStop.com is a pretty bad name. So, Um, game is good to have in the name. They sell games, although now they're selling like collectibles. So it's not perfect, but, um, you want, you don't want to stop. You want to, you know, it should be game start of anything. You want to play the game.
So then you don't want to have negative vibes, negative, uh, sort of, you don't want people not to do the thing that you want them to do. So GameStop, I think is actually a pretty, pretty bad name. This name was changed, but Google Gemini, their chat GPT competitor, was originally called Google Bard. Bard literally sounds like I'm throwing up.
When I throw up, I sound, I just bard all over the place. So I'm happy they changed it. Gemini to me is a tofu name. We're going to talk more about tofu names in a second. But just, yeah, just not a really good name at all.
I just tweeted about this app called Social AI, which went viral, which is this idea around, it's basically like a Twitter app, except you have zero human followers and they just give you like a million AI followers and you post and then you get like thousands of replies, all AI generated. But it's called social AI and it's like the least social thing it is. To me, what's a sort of phrase?
What would I call this? I'd probably use a phrase and I'd call it maincharacter.ai. It makes you the main character. I just think that this feels a bit tofu to me. I don't really get it. But maincharacter.ai, I totally get. Claude. Um, clode.ai is, you know, on one hand is good because it's like a person and a brand and you can kind of see it and it's French.
So maybe it's like, I don't know, higher quality. Um, but it's hard to spell for the, for Americans. They don't really get it, you know? So I think, I think that they were on the right track, but, um, Maybe pick Pierre over Claude, easier to spell. And also, come on, Claude, people. Where's the vibe here? Where's the brand? This just feels so lame. It's like that gray could be so much more.
They could be making a more lovable brand, minimal lovable product here. And by the way, I'm sharing all this stuff so you just get in my head, so you become the biggest, best name expert on the planet. I have some of the biggest brands call me up And they're just like, hey, Greg, I need a name. They know I'm the name guy. So I try to give you all that alpha free.
I think perplexity is a really good name. Perplexity.ai, the search engine, because being perplexed, you don't have the answers. So here's where the answers are. And I think, I don't know if you all have seen, but the perplexity ads, they go hard. Like here, look at this, Perplexity, know it all, search and discover with AI. So this is their, I guess their splash, well, it's not a splash screen.
It's really just like, yeah, it's a kind of a logged out screen on web. And it's beautiful. And it gets you connected to the Perplexity brand. I think they do a really, really, really, really good job here. And probably one of the reasons why they're, I think their last valuation was 3 billion. The brand matters, the name matters. This is an app called Bump. It's a location sharing app.
And when you're with your friend, you shake your phone and you bump. And basically that sends a notification to all your friends who... who are following you, so you bump when you're together. And it's starting to take off, like 79th in social networking in the US. I think this is really cool as a name because it's the action that they want you to do.
So thinking about if you're doing an app, you're doing a consumer app, consumer software, picking the verb is a pretty smart way of naming an app. I had to throw this one in here when I was like, Claude is kind of a not great name. Most of you probably don't remember this search engine. It was in the 90s. It was called Ask Jeeves. And they took out all the branding here, but back in the day...
it was this dude. It looked like this. He showed up and you went to Google something and you had this legend right over here and it was Ash Jeeves and he was handing you the results on a silver platter. Love that name. Can do a lot with the brand and definitely goes viral. This is an app. I'm actually going to bring the founder on the pod as well.
So depending on when this goes live, check it out. His name is Chris Josephs. So Autopilot is this really cool thing. And they started off with a Twitter account, like the Nancy Pelosi tracker, where they would see what Nancy Pelosi would trade. And then they started doing Michael Burry, the dude from the Big Short. So they created an app based on these Twitter, I guess, and Instagram handles.
And they said, do you want to copy these people's trades? Go for it. And I think Autopilot is such a good name because it's just... you're not going to, I don't care how good of an investor you are. You're not going to outcompete Nancy Pelosi. We all know this by now. Don't even try. So, uh, pressing a button and just copying trades, I think is really, really smart.
Um, and calling it autopilot, just like, I get it. Um, Last good name, this is a sauna slash ice bath slash breath work company. They started off in Toronto, now they're in New York City. And then they built an app that became quite popular, which is just you can tune into these breathing exercises. And it's called Other Ship. And Other Ship, I have no idea really what it means.
I just know that the people that go to this are the types of people that are sober, that care about their health, that talk about clean living. Um, and it just feels like other ship. It's like a ship that's like another ship that you probably should be on. It's leaving, you know, it's leaving the Marina, go jump on. Um, and it's just like other lifestyle that you can go ahead and have.
And, and, and, you know, I've been, I've actually been to one of these and the Toronto one, and it is like a very unique experience. It's not just like a, uh, uh, It's not just like a steam sauna place. It's more than that. And it's just like an other experience. So I think they did a good job. Now, what's an example of a tofu brand? Aloe. It's like... What? It doesn't speak to me.
I don't really connect to it. And I know I'm not the target audience, obviously, for this. But I just don't think it's a memorable name. And when you don't have a memorable name and you have a tofu name, your job gets harder. Your job gets a lot harder. And who needs it? Building a startup is hard as it is. You need all the luck on your side. So I think that's a pretty tofu name.
We actually changed the name. Before we were DesignScientist.com, which is a design agency that is part copywriting agency, part marketing agency, part design agency. We create design assets that convert. And before we did that, We were called such a tofu name. It was called Dispatch. Dispatch could be like literally a coffee shop. It could be a recruiting agency. It could be a design agency.
So it didn't mean anything. And we change it. And as soon as we change it, revenue, conversion, everything went up. Put together a little kind of checklist around how do you hack your way to a novel name. So step one, create a note on your phone. I call it the name game, just like on your iPhone or whatever. Call it the name game.
And then as you're going along life, you're going to hear a word that is going to captivate you. or you're going to be like, that's super catchy. So for example, maybe you get poured a Coke and you start drinking it and you're like, oh my God, that's a flat soda. And then you're like, whoa, flat soda? That's a good name for a startup. Boom, put it in. Now,
once every two weeks, see if that name is available on places like IG, Twitter, X, TikTok. Go and grab as many handles as you can. You can be a hoarder of some of these names. Don't worry, these handles, nothing wrong with that. Quick ad break. Let me tell you about a business I invested in. It's called boringmarketing.com.
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And then like test the name out at dinner with your friends, in conversation with your family, with your friends. Just like, hey, what do you think about this name for this thing? And the ones that resonate make a logo for them. can the name be transferred into a visual representation of what you imagine? So that's the path.
And if you can't come up with names by just walking, going for a walk, and things are not hitting for you, I would say start with the community. What are you building? uh for who like who's it for so if it's for dentists um what are the pain points that dentists have what are some new phrases that they have um and then what's the essence of these phrases um
And just start brainstorming from there. I usually go to Claude and I'm saying, I use this prompt, then you can have it. I'm brainstorming names around XYZ topic. So as an example, I'm brainstorming names around an AI software agent that answers restaurants and takes orders. What are some interesting, clear, direct names that speak to this community?
We can just do it live because we're live cooking. And I know you all love the live cooking. Let's do this. Do that. Boom. And then let's see what people, what it comes up with. So we got like Dinebot, OrderMind, Cuisinassist, MenuMate, FoodieAI, ServeLogic, DishDecider, ByteBot. Bytebot's like pretty good because it's got that alliteration. But yeah, I think then you see like, is this a phrase?
Is this descriptive? Is it funny? And you could say like, I want more of a funny one. I want more of a descriptive one. Can you make a one word versus two words? Do you want it three words? Do you want it short? Do you want it long? Yeah. And then you just use Claude as your naming assistant, as your Greg Eisenberg. It's just me, you know... Make Claude me, basically, and get feedback.
And then put that on your name list and get feedback. So that's most of what I got. I wanted to give you a few names on my list, on my name game list, just as like, you made it here, you know? You made it here, I'm going to give you these names. So... One is called after party.
I don't know what it's for, like what you'd use it for, but like the after party is something that a lot of people, uh, you know, want to go to. It's fun. Maybe it's exclusive. I think there's something there. Um, and by the way, some of these you might not like, and they might be bad. And that's the other thing is on your name game, uh, list. It's okay to have bad names.
Um, and then you can just remove them or just keep them.
Nothing wrong with that. Um, pretty perfect.
Not sure what it'd be before, but like the idea of pretty perfect, you got that alliterations. I think that it sounds, uh, pretty beautiful. Um, what else we got? Inventation only, you know, by invitation only. I think I saw that on like, uh, a wedding invitation, something nice about that. Maybe you create like a paid community that's invite only for a particular group.
InCred, so it's short for incredible. You want to create something that's incredible, InCred, you probably can get that domain, probably can't get incredible.com. So that's kind of an interesting one.
And maybe that's it for now.
If you like this, I'll share more ideas, more names. I want you all to comment on what are some tofu names, what are some good names, what are some bad names. Hope this has been helpful. I love doing these tutorials because I think it really does
hopefully make a difference in how you think about doing stuff, how you actually not just create startup ideas, but actually go and build the startup ideas. So, um, that's what the channel is evolving to. It's not just about ideas. It's about tutorials, about making things happen, about putting things into the world. It's about shipping. Uh, it's about getting customers, about building community.
It's about building internet audiences. So if you like this, uh, you can give me a little tip with a like comment, subscribe, share, and, uh, I think that's it for today. Thanks for watching. Thanks for listening. And happy naming.