What's in a name? Those of you who know the Zadoodle brand, as humble and small as it is, most likely associate it with vintage: vintage store, vintage blog, vintage sheetmusic. I like that it also conveys the quirky side of my personality. But maintaining an online vintage store is a huge endeavor, and I'm considering a reinvention of my Zadoodle persona, so I thought I'd share my thoughts on branding.
A Name That Allows You to Reinvent Yourself
When I was searching for a name for my "online presence," I was at a loss. Generally speaking, I am a bit of a rolling stone and I didn't want to be stuck with one type of business forever. If I picked something that said "designs", "vintage" or a derivative of the two, I would always be stuck with a name that implied one thing. So coming up with something generic appealed to me since I never intended to stay with the same genre forever.
A Name That Makes You Unique
I am unashamed to say that when I came up with the name Zadoodle, I dreamed big. I thought of other companies that had gone before me and made it big, companies like Google and Yahoo, whose names are ridiculous but now are undeniably household names. Google has even become a verb. (Hmmm... what would I be doing if I "zadoodled"???)
A Name You Can Use Everywhere
The trouble I had when trying to use words that already existed was that I couldn't use the same name on Google/Yahoo/Facebook/Twitter/MySpace/Flickr/Anywhere else you can imagine. I wanted a name that I could take with me everywhere. You can go just about anywhere online and if you look for Zadoodle, there I am!
A Name You Can Trust
I don't think Zadoodle has been around long enough yet to have earned the right to say "Zadoodle is a name you can trust." I would like to think everyone who has come in contact with Zadoodle has had a positive experience, but I don't want to get cocky. I have learned that trustworthiness is part of brand building. I am also learning that transparency is part of trustworthiness; being public online is a bit unnerving, and I confess the concept of perfect strangers knowing personal things about me is scary. I'm an outgoing person, but I'm actually not a huge publicity-hound, especially since the web is an ideal place for unsavory types to hide behind online personas. Eventually I will post a photo of myself and therefore achieve true transparency.
A Name That Allows You to Reinvent Yourself
When I was searching for a name for my "online presence," I was at a loss. Generally speaking, I am a bit of a rolling stone and I didn't want to be stuck with one type of business forever. If I picked something that said "designs", "vintage" or a derivative of the two, I would always be stuck with a name that implied one thing. So coming up with something generic appealed to me since I never intended to stay with the same genre forever.
A Name That Makes You Unique
I am unashamed to say that when I came up with the name Zadoodle, I dreamed big. I thought of other companies that had gone before me and made it big, companies like Google and Yahoo, whose names are ridiculous but now are undeniably household names. Google has even become a verb. (Hmmm... what would I be doing if I "zadoodled"???)
A Name You Can Use Everywhere
The trouble I had when trying to use words that already existed was that I couldn't use the same name on Google/Yahoo/Facebook/Twitter/MySpace/Flickr/Anywhere else you can imagine. I wanted a name that I could take with me everywhere. You can go just about anywhere online and if you look for Zadoodle, there I am!
A Name You Can Trust
I don't think Zadoodle has been around long enough yet to have earned the right to say "Zadoodle is a name you can trust." I would like to think everyone who has come in contact with Zadoodle has had a positive experience, but I don't want to get cocky. I have learned that trustworthiness is part of brand building. I am also learning that transparency is part of trustworthiness; being public online is a bit unnerving, and I confess the concept of perfect strangers knowing personal things about me is scary. I'm an outgoing person, but I'm actually not a huge publicity-hound, especially since the web is an ideal place for unsavory types to hide behind online personas. Eventually I will post a photo of myself and therefore achieve true transparency.
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