Choosing a blog name is DIFFICULT. It’s arguably the hardest part about starting a blog. The name is your brand, your future, and how people will remember you. Of course it’s possible to change your name in the future, but it can be a tough transition, so it’s easier to get it right the first time.
I’m going to share three tools that I’ve found useful when coming up with website or blog names!
Name Mesh
Name Mesh is one of the coolest tools ever. I recently used it when trying to find a name for one of my side projects. It allows you to input keywords, then it finds good domain names based on those keywords. But it looks in several different sections. I think the best is the Similar section. This one uses an intelligent algorithm (and tools like a thesaurus) to find unique names based on what you entered. So if I put in nose graze, here are some of the suggestions it gives me:
- lipgraze.com
- noseherd.com
- nosechick.com
- nosebury.com
- nosemunch.com
- nosenap.com
- snoutgraze.com
- noselaze.com
And as it spits back the results, it checks the availability of the domain names and hides the taken ones.
LeanDomainSearch
LeanDomainSearch is another great tool for coming up with a name, while checking the availability of it. You enter a keyword that you want the domain name to include and the site automatically pairs that word with other commonly found keywords and spits back the results. It’s a great way to find a name if you already have one “must-have” keyword in mind.
NameChk
NameChk is a tool that allows you to input a username and see if it’s available or not on all social media sites. This is incredibly useful for checking how common or used a certain name is.
I went through a couple names before Heather Hearts Books stuck. I tried the Young Adult Book Binge for a few months. But that was before I got super into it. I forget what else I tried. Heather Hearts Books came to me late one night. And there was another Heather Hearts Books, but the person hadn’t accessed the blog or posted on it in over four years at the time, and still hasn’t. And she didn’t own the domain, so I snapped it up. 🙂 And it wasn’t really a book review blog. Just someone’s personal blog and that was the username they chose.
These are so cool. I checked my new blog name and it seems to be a good one. Not too common and mostly available. For Namechk, it did say wordpress is using my new name, but I searched the name in general and it seems to be available. Should I be worried?
Nah. You don’t need to be worried if it’s taken on one or two sites. Especially because you won’t even be using it on WordPress.com anyway. The only ones I’d personally be worried about are Twitter and Facebook.
Ooh those are very nice websites, I’m going to save them for future reference! For me it wasn’t really too difficult to find a name; the name I use now is my favourite song from my favourite band, and I’d been using it for my photography for a while already – so when I started this blog I just decided to go for the same name as well (I had used several different names before but it never really felt right).. ^^
This would have been so helpful when I started blogging lol. I had a random name at first, but changed it when I got into book blogging. I checked the name on Google and I didn’t see any matches so I went for it.
Funnily enough, the brilliant idea of naming my book blog “Books Keep Me Sane” came when I was washing the dishes. LOL. I agree that naming your blog is one of the hardest part of starting a blog, it took me almost a whole month to do it! These tools you mentioned are very helpful. 😀 I;m going to use these if I want to build a new blog.
My blog name has always bothered me… my blog was going to start out as a personal blog then I got bored with that after like a month or two and switched to book blogging. I have had it so long I don’t want to change it now. Too bad I didn’t about a better name sooner.
Naming your blog is indeed one of the most important and difficult tasks. And I can’t even imagine what a pain it would be to change the name mid-stream.
Long before I had my blog, I had the idea for the name BOLO Books. Since I have always read crime fiction, the term BOLO (for Be On the Look Out or Lookout – depending on the source you use) was one I was familiar with. When I decided I wanted to blog about books in order to bring readers to those books, it just made sense to go with it.
From there, my eyeball logo developed. After naming your blog, the LOGO can be the next difficult, yet important decision. These two together (name and logo) will represent you for a very long time. Choose wisely.
You’re right—the logo is probably the next toughest thing!
Ashley, you are the best! Thanks for such an awesome post. I have needed tools like this for quite some time now. So, thanks again!
I wish I had known of namemesh before I settled on my blog name! That would have been so helpful and likely would have resulted in something a little better! I’ll definitely remember that for the next project I embark on.
This is great timing – my fiance has been trying to find a name for his future film studio (he’s an aspiring director) with an available domain name. I’ll have to have him try these!!
As for mine, I kind of stumbled on it by accident. Someone mentioned using their favorite band/artist in their blog name and I started looking at MY favorite band (Avenged Sevenfold), and when I tweeted about my ideass Chrys gave me a suggestion that was perfect! And here I am 🙂
It wasn’t really difficult for me to look for a blog name. I wanted something that would make people remember it, something that has a unique and catchy touch, something that doesn’t really emphasize “reading” but when you hear it, you go, “Oh, those are the potatoes that read books!” But when I was thinking of a name for my personal blog, my friend told me to look up the titles of my favorite books, and maybe work from there. I chose Anne Bishop’s “Written in Red” and since I loved the color of Blue, I made it “Written in Blue” and it is so like me XD
I took me DAYS. I suck at coming up with website names even more than I suck at coming up with usernames. And every time I did have an idea, the name was already taken or didn’t work for some other reason. I polled some of my friends, but I think after the tenth suggestion they sort of lost interest. I finally settled on reviewsandcake.com because I wanted something content-related and cake… well, cake makes everything better, right? Right. 😀
Nice name! 😀 You’re right—cake makes everything better!
You are right these tools are great. I like the domain name checker, and the lean domain approach. The account-name-available checker appears to be fency but I do not see a need for it. Why is it important to have a common acocunt name on all platforms? Just for the blog? I guess the tool also drives a lot of traffic on these pages.
It’s important if you’re building a brand. One of the best ways to market your brand is to be consistent. If you have different names across all social media platforms, it can be confusing for your viewers.
Also, ensuring you’re the only one with that name helps you to come out higher in search results for your name.
Ugh! I have an idea for a blog about productivity and organization and I keep coming up with names that I love! WorkSmarter was my first choice. Then I started even grasping at straws, but even Productivity Penguin is taken in many places. I’m having so much trouble! Domain squatters suck!
Coming up with names is super tough. 🙁