Names are leverage. The right one is sticky, sayable, and loaded with meaning. The wrong one is a permanent headwind, misspelled, mispronounced, and forgotten.

The tests every name must pass

  • Sayable: If people hesitate to pronounce it, they won't recommend it.
  • Spellable: Heard once, typed correctly. Domains and search depend on it.
  • Distinct: It should stand apart in a crowded category, not blend in.
  • Expandable: Don't box yourself into a single product or city you'll outgrow.
A name doesn't have to describe what you do. It has to be impossible to forget.

Meaning is built, not found

Some of the strongest brands started as invented or abstract words. They earned meaning through consistency. Your name is an empty vessel on day one, what fills it is everything you do afterward. We help founders choose a name with room to grow, then build the world that gives it weight.

Test the name in the real world before you commit

Most founders fall in love with a name inside a document. That is the worst possible place to judge one. A name only proves itself out loud, in a noisy room, spoken by someone who has never seen it written down.

  • The phone test: Say it to five people and ask them to type it into a browser. If more than one gets it wrong, the name is leaking traffic before you have even launched.
  • The trademark test: Search the register in every market you intend to sell in. Falling in love first and checking later is how brands end up rebranding in year three.
  • The shout test: It has to survive a bad phone line, a busy trade show floor and a podcast host reading it cold.

Then check what the internet already thinks. Search the name, look at what comes back, and work out whether you are launching into an open lane or an existing conversation you cannot win. That now includes asking the AI assistants directly, because a growing share of buyers meet a brand through an answer rather than a search result.

Lock it down on day one

Secure the domain, the handles and the trademark before you tell anyone outside the room. Names leak. The cost of taking all three up front is trivial next to the cost of rebuilding recognition you have already paid for.