Why Audience Testing is a Crucial Step in the Business Naming Process

After a hardworking entrepreneur like yourself has dedicated hours or maybe even days of brainstorming and getting ride of every possibility, you have finally come across the perfect name for your digital marketing agency. Or, at least you think it be the perfect name.

If your brand name cannot generate enough word of mouth and interest with your target demographic, all of the time and effort you put into coming up with your digital marketing brand name will have been wasted. Our complete guide for coming up with a business name will help you get the most out of the time you dedicate to selecting a name for your new business.

Come up with a bunch of great names

This is the perfect time to start getting creative and thinking outside of the block. Continue writing down every business name suggestion you can possibly think of. Don’t feel pressure to judge whether the names are good or not. Just keeping brainstorming digital marketing business names.

Remember that a high-quality name has to be simple to say, spell, and impossible for your target audience to forget. In addition, make sure that you perform a quick search to double check that there is a suitable URL available for your digital marketing agency. This will help prevent you from falling in love with a given business name only to discover that the name is already in use or the domain is way too pricey for your budget.

Create a shortlist

Once you have gathered a number of potential names for your new digital marketing business you can start to get rid of the names that you don’t think will work with your overall tone of your brand. The purpose of this step is to get you to narrow down your choices so you have around four or five potential names remaining.

In addition, you should consider more than just what you as the business owner thinks of the name, you should keep in mind the audience you are trying to appeal to. Not all audiences will respond to a name in the same way. For example, millennials may not prefer a traditional, established name in the same way that previous generations might gravitate towards that type of name.

Get feedback from your target demographic

After you have compiled a great shortlist, it is the perfect opportunity to invite some outside opinions. It’s always a good idea to ask members of your target audience what they think about your name because their opinion is the most important for your brand’s success. You can narrow down your target audience based on various factors like their gender, age, location, hobbies and interests. In addition, when asking your target audience about the name make sure that they slow down to fully consider your question and your name in the specific context of your digital marketing brand.

Here are a couple of examples of what the questions for your target audience should look like:

  • Which one of these apartment hunting apps are you most interested in learning more about?
  • Which one of these denim jacket brands are you most likely to try?

The questions that are rooted in a strong are the most effective because they make your target audience slow down and think about your specific your brand in the context of your business.

You can also try asking questions that are based on value or benefit propositions. For example:

  • Which one of these names would be the best fit for a small bookshop that wants to give customers the feeling of being in a magical world of fantasy?
  • Which of these production companies names do you feel most embodies prestige and trust?

Analyze your results

Finally, it is time to examine the results of your audience testing.  You might find that the results may surprise you, or maybe they won’t. We have found it is very common, in the thousands of name tests we’ve now performed with our customers, the customer’s favourite name will simply perform terribly with their target audience. And this is the reality check that makes the testing process so important for entrepreneurs.

Of course, there isn’t a foolproof testing method that will give you a clear, and exact answer as to whether or not your digital marketing brand name will be a success. However, audience testing can add an additional level to your name validation process. It can help you choose a business name that will do well with your audience.

Grant Polachek is the Director of Marketing at Inc 500 company Squadhelp.com, the worlds #1 naming platform, with nearly 20,000 customers from the smallest startups across the globe to the largest corporations including Nestle, Philips, Hilton, Pepsi, and AutoNation. Get inspired by exploring these cool company names.

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