Having a blog for local businesses is highly important these days as it serves as a cheaper way for the small businesses to drive traffic to the site. This helps the inbound marketing efforts and attracts more prospective customers to the business.
Here are some reasons why all small local businesses should use the power of blogging.
1. Excellent boost to business website search engine optimization
2. Helps to develop and maintain existing and new customer relationships
3. Let’s you establish your business in a way to stand out from the competition
4. Create opportunities for sharing
5. Connect more people to your brand
Why did I feel it was important to touch upon this topic today? Well, I just felt the need for it. Every other day, I see more and more businesses turning towards content, social media and email marketing to improve their SEO game.
This involves blogging, in particular. The problem arrives when they are not sure about how to come up with a blog name.
Even when they figure that out somehow, I have seen some underwhelming attempts at naming small business blogs.
While you can create a blog for free these days as a frugal entrepreneur using various tools and platforms online, it is usually not that impressive for the customers as it lacks the factor of branding in it.
Branding is really important for all the businesses and even more important when it comes to naming them. There are some things that you need to keep in mind before you can actually start a blog for your business.
We shall discuss some tips here, which will help you form a brand worthy name for your business blog. Read on to find out these essential tips, which will help you establish a brand identity and not just a blog.
1. Play With Your List Of Descriptive Words
Building up on what we mentioned in the first tip, you can make a list of words that describe your brand and list them down. You may use a thesaurus to come up with more words that are similar in meaning but catchier.
Now choose the most effective words from your list and then arrange them in a meaningful way. Play with these words, try different combinations, and different arrangements etc to come up with something that not only describes your business goal but also sounds valuable to your target market i.e. your prospective customers.
2. Name That Includes Keywords
When you choose a powerful blog name, it is important that you always keep your key purpose of the blog in mind i.e. search engine optimization.
Your blog name is the best SEO hack for your blog. Google looks for keywords in the domain name, site title and then the body of the pages.
Therefore, having the keywords or exactly matching key phrases in the blog name will result in your blog rank higher in the search results for the relevant searches.
For example, if you are in the plumbing business, you can use various Google tools to look for the keywords used for related searches and then use them effectively in your blog name.
Using this method, in conjunction with the first two tips, can help you come up with an amazing and unique name that is also ready for branding.
3. The Domain Name Test
Once you are done with the above exercise, move to the next step. You need to check if the website URL is available for the name you chose. Doing this is easy. Go to platforms like godaddy.com and type in the name ideas (you should preferable have more than one).
If you find it available, congratulations! You have done it! If it is not available, this is why you were required to have more than one name ideas. Search for the rest and you would be able to secure a few viable options.
There are various other factors that you need to keep in mind before choosing a domain name.
You can slightly change the name and try if you still can’t find the domain of your choice. When a domain is not available, it is an opportunity to know whether someone else is already using that name. In such cases, you should try something entirely different so that it doesn’t create confusion.
4. Let Go - Use Your Company Name
While your brand name is important, it is not all that matters. All the great things you are planning to do with the blog are of greater importance.
The name alone won’t define your brand. In fact, it’s the brand that should reflect in the name. You should deliver value to a customer that changes his or her lifestyle in a way that fulfills the promise your brand name makes.
Put more emphasis on what message your brand conveys and how effectively it does so. Therefore, you should put some thought into the name.
However, if you can’t find something effective, don’t wait too long to execute your idea. It might get too late. You can simply use your business website, if you already have one, to make a blog. Otherwise, start a blog with your company’s name and begin.
Common Characteristics Of Brandable Domains
For a name of a business to be brandable, it has to have some characteristics. Here are some of those characteristics. You need to make sure to incorporate some, if not all of these, when deciding a brandable business blog name.
Relevant – The name should be relevant to your business and most importantly your business goals. Through either complementary or implied meaning, the keywords should relate to the mission statement, the products or your business even if they do not directly describe it.
Unique – This should go without saying - your name needs to stand out from the competition and be different to say the least. The name needs to express a unique persona while being intriguing for the users.
Memorable – A name should be easier to remember and recall. Names that are easier to recall would place the businesses in the top of the customers’ heads whenever they need services related to what you provide. You should also bear in mind that this is different from uniqueness.
Credible – The name should sound professional as well as trustworthy. This is an important quality for a brand name to have. In addition to this, the name should be creative and unique. Remember, adding adjectives like “best”, “top”, or “quality” in the name doesn’t necessarily mean a brand name imbues those characteristics. In fact, having to mention them in the name indicates the opposite.
Brief – The name should ideally be a two to three word phrase and nothing more. A name like this has more chances to become memorable. Also, it can be distracting to have a name that is longer than three words.
User-friendly – The name should be user friendly. Yes, you read that right, a user-friendly name. It should be easy to say and easy to spell. In addition to this, there should not be any aural confusion like ‘eight’ or ‘ate’. Moreover, it is better not to use any numbers or improper abbreviations.
Try not to use inside jargon in the name. Create a brand name that a user can relate to like The Lean Startup.
Over To You
By this time, you must have realized that just naming a business or a business blog is not as easy as it may seem. There is a lot that goes behind naming a business or a blog. However, it can be simpler if you have a direction in mind.
Once you know what you want to achieve through the blog website, it will not be as difficult either. Now that you have the complete guide, you should wait no longer before executing your blog idea.
While it is necessary to have a unique, creative and a brandable name for the business blog, it is not something that is quite necessary. If you cannot come up with a name, do not hold back your amazing ideas just because of the name.
Bill Acholla is a growth strategist working with B2B companies. If you’ve enjoyed this article feel free to share it out to your social media followers.
I hope you enjoyed this article about how to choose a brand worthy blog name for your small local business and build branding.
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Read My Blog Posts:
- How To Have A Powerful And Purposeful Website Strategy
- Opportunities Where Content Marketing And Paid Blogging Meet
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