Saturday, February 26, 2011

Name Game: "What's in a Name" Revisited

Last Saturday's post contained examples of Starving Jewelry Artist members business names. Each member had a definite need: choose a name that best fit who they were and what they did. On the forum, Starving Jewelry Artists a new member recently asked about how we chose our names. All answers had one unique point: make yourself different from others. And yes, that's what happens.
Now, ask yourself: how do I choose a name that describes either me or what I do, or better yet, both. And then what?
So, here's what I did: personally, I preferred a name with an image. Okay, what image? I had one of my cats in my lap at the time. I love cats, like
Cat's Wire
obviously does. Okay, that name's taken. Soooo, how about:

Laughing Cat...taken
Sleeping Cat...taken
Dancing Cat....taken
Quiet Cat......taken
Cold Cat.......taken
Kold Cat.......taken
Astral Cat.....taken
Rose 'n' Cat...taken
Cat and Roses..taken

Well, you get the idea: lots of people really really like cats. Even Screaming Cat was taken but it didn't feel right to me. And neither did Dancing with Cats mostly because I look nothing like Kevin Costner. Finally: Dead Cat Designs Yup, taken but really really weird site.

So, moving on to some of nature's beautiful images:
Shaking Leaf Designs...taken
Shaking Leaves.........taken
Fallen Leaf............taken
Autumn Leaves..........taken
Birch Leaf.............taken
Autumn Leaves..........taken

Or: Birch Tree Designs...taken
Autumn Ridge....taken
Sleeping Rose...taken (Makes me think of a Disney cartoon. Not good.)
Sleeping Flower...taken
Flaming Flower...taken
Red Flower......taken
Brown Flower....taken
Quiet Tree....taken (That's okay, I'm not a quiet person.)
Sleeping Tree...taken
Spirit of the Earth...taken (I really liked this one.)
High Tree....taken
Dancing Tree...taken
Dead Earth Designs...FREE!!!!!(But honestly, would you buy from this site?)

Well, you get the idea. I even tried a variation on my name: Crusin' Susan.
Yup, taken, as well as it was someone's name...

Now, this is only one of the many steps you need to take. You need to buy the domain name quickly so when you get a site customers find you, not someone who makes odd things, really odd.

And here's how my cats felt about my problem. You can see how concerned they were.


Written by a member of the this team (currently experiencing an identity crisis...)Featuring artisan handmade creations by the Starving Artists jewelry Team, the SATeam members create handcrafted jewelry and beads. More information about our team and its current shop owner members can be found at SATEAM.etsy.com and on ArtFire.

7 comments:

Cat said...

That post cracked me up, Sue! Especially the picture with the most interested cats ;-)

Anonymous said...

Great post, lots of fun to read.

DawninCal said...

Loved this post, Sue!

You've described pretty much how my experience went...lists and lists of possibilities and most taken until it clicked.

Doesn't look like the cats were much help either!

PaintinByFaith said...

Oh funny! I didn't go through a list so much ... but my name is rather different I guess. Although I really did want to go with something new when I started jewelry ... but I was already known. I loved reatding this!

AMDesignsbyAngela said...

Very amusing and oh so true...

Jeanne/J3Jewelry said...

Great post... I laughed a lot... did the same thing with lists and trying to match up words together for something cool. I had obsessed over the word "Bijoux" for a long time but just couldn't find a combination that wasn't either taken or didn't sound silly... one of the things I did not mention in my own blog post about choosing my business name, but this post made me think of that. LOVE your cats... yea, they seem really worried about your delimma. lol

Stacie @ azoho.com said...

That was funny. Picking a name is a lot harder than it seems it would be. And I STILL changed it when I started making jewelry- Creative Junque was great for mixed media, but my sister convinced me that nobody would want to buy jewelry from a shop with junque in the name. So then I played with letters. Azoho is my children's initials with hugs in there for good measure. And because I needed vowels! Great post.