taxi. Snapchat is about chatting, rapidly. • Is your name distinctive? Uber meant little until it became your ondemand chauffeur. If you can’t cut through the noise with a clear name, make one up. Etsy was a nonsense word, but is now synonymous with ‘e clever? Does it make people smile? The Square app allows you to ‘square up’ your bill. Pinterest allows me to ‘pin’ all the things I find interesting. • Can your name become a verb? Hailo me a taxi, Google that word. This is one of the most powerful characteristics – and one you can’t force. But you can ensure that your name is conducive to this usage. If you manage to get all these characteristics in place, you’re off to an amazing start. It may not be possible to integrate all these things in your name, but do remember that the time you invest at these early stages pays off down the line. A great name and brand are huge enablers for your app to become truly iconic. Finding a great name Frankly, I have found that drunken conversations involving a group of friends brainstorming (with shots as prizes for good ideas) tend to be the best – and most fun – generator of fun names and more original ideas. One thing to remember is that the final name of your app is quite closely coupled with your domain name. Why? Because one of the main interactions between you and your users is your website – people will Google it, or click through to your website from an article or review. So the process of name generation will invariably involve checking whether a version of your app name is either available or can be purchased for a reasonable amount. There’s a great variety of tools and services online that can help you solve your current identity crisis.

But, if that’s not your thing, you can check out a variety of online services that will help you through the process

NameStation is a powerful combination of wordgeneration tools – from random-word generators (with character, special symbol and number options) to suffix and prefix tools – that all go and search

the availability of the dotcom and other top-level domains in real time. Very handy. Imagine you’re building a healthy-food app. You might enter words such as ‘tasty’, ‘healthy’ and it helps by generating more, similar, words, and then immediately checks whether domains such as tastyapp, healthyfood and hundreds of other permutations are available. SEDO. This is probably the largest – and most usable – premium domain

reseller on the Internet. In one central place you can see all the great domain names you’d kill to own that enterprising individuals have already purchased and are now trying to resell (to entrepreneurs like you) at an inflated price. It’s vexing – but buying domain names is a just land grab. The site is easy to use – and reputable. I’ve purchased domains here before and had a flawless experience – but, as mentioned before, be ready to part with a few thousand dollars to get something short, catchy and memorable. DOMAINNAMESOUP. This is a pretty fun site. For those looking to grab a

Not only do they help you come up with great ideas, but they also check to see whether there is a ESTATION

short and unique name such as etsy, it helpfully lists all the available three-, four- and five-character domains – and also the ones that are currently for sale. It also has a big selection of tools to generate all kinds of company and app names for all kinds of industries and segments. I’ve used it many times and recommended it – with great feedback – to a lot of people. INSTANTDOMAINSEARCH. This is a simple and handy site that allows you