Ok, time for me to rant now because there is one thing I see entrepreneurs and business owners do that is just out-right stupid.

Naming the company after themselves.

There are times when this fits and other times when it’s just out-right idiotic. Here is a bottom-line rule to follow, if you ever want to be able to SELL your company, don’t brand your name (or you better be ready to get sold with the company).

Also, if you’re branding your name to the general consumer public, you want to stick to a name that will not likely change. It’s much harder to re-brand a name when there are millions of people that know it, rather than when only a few clients know it (or a smaller market knows it).

Here is an example of when it’s ok to brand your own name:

A legal or accounting practice where your name is what people really look for. In a case like this, it’s un-likely that you’ll sell. You’ll probably “merge” and add more names to your name. Or even if you did sell, it would only require you to alert your clients. There would be little branding

Here is an example of when it doesn’t make sense and it makes me want to slap someone:

A company that sells computers called “Daniel K. Smith Computers” - what the hell is that? First of all, it’s a stupid name. Second of all, it’s going to be hard as hell to sell that to another company unless you agree to go with it - the consumers are used to YOU and that’s what they want to find when they walk into a store.

If you really do want to brand your name, go with just the last name like “Smith Computers” - that can still be neutral.

When deciding the name you want to throw your branding power behind, just think about one question:

“Do you want to sell this company one day?”

If you do, then please, don’t brand yourself or your name - brand the company.

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On a seperate note, many times you have a neutral company name, but you still choose to brand yourself. You’re always in the store, you sign every e-mail to customers from yourself, you make all the public appearances, etc…

This is a bad idea - it centralizes the company around YOU too much and it makes it hard to delegate work and not have your hands in everything. If the company grows with your hand in everything, your life is going to suck and the business will eventually suffer.

Here is an example of how it should work:

All your customer e-mails, have your “support director” sign off.
All your marketing matters, have your VP of Marketing sign off.
All your financial matters, have your CFO sign off.
All your HR matters, have that department head sign off.

The only time I think a CEO should be specifically signing his/her name should be on MAJOR matters, investor related matters or any major announcements to the industry.

I work very hard to hide myself as much as possible so that I can be considered ‘despensable” when it comes time to sell. I didn’t always do this, as of now the company still has my name linked to it, but I’ve started working hard to disconnect and it seems to be working.

When I sell this company, I don’t want to go with it (not for long at least). The less the company needs me to run properly, the easier it is to sell the company without my neck attached to it.

The next time you sign-off on something public, think twice if it’s really your name that should show up there.     

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