Test whether somebody can spell your name after hearing it once. If they cannot, register the likely misspellings and always pair the name with a description.

The moment that matters

A customer recommends you to a neighbour, in conversation, and says your name once.

The neighbour does not write it down. Later, needing the service, they type what they remember into a search box.

If what they type does not find you, the referral is lost, and neither party ever knows it happened.

That sequence is how a large share of small business work arrives, and it depends entirely on a name surviving being heard once and typed later.

What makes a name fail

The first is the most self-inflicted. A deliberately altered spelling looks distinctive on a van and means every spoken referral produces a search for the ordinary spelling instead.

The test

Two minutes, and it settles the question.

Say your business name once to somebody who has not seen it written, and ask them to write it down.

Do it with five people, and note every version you get back.

Those versions are what your customers are typing, and they are not a hypothetical.

A name that produces five identical spellings is fine. One that produces four different ones has a problem you can now describe precisely.

Do the same over the phone, which is harsher, since the line loses consonants and that is how many people first hear it.

Register the misspellings

The practical remedy, and it costs very little.

Register the domains people actually typed in your test, and redirect them to your site.

Two or three of them covers most of the loss, and each costs about the price of a coffee per year.

Do the same in search advertising if you run any, since bidding on common misspellings of your own name is cheap and catches exactly this traffic.

Check what people are already typing, in your search reporting, where misspellings show up as terms that led somebody to you and reveal the ones you did not anticipate.

Always pair the name with the trade

The habit that rescues a name people cannot spell.

Somebody who types your name incorrectly may still find you if they add the trade and the town, because those words are unambiguous.

So make sure your site, listing, and everything else pairs the name with a plain description and a place, consistently.

Ask customers to recommend you the same way: tell people the trade and the town alongside the name rather than the name alone.

That is more robust than the name itself, and it is what actually gets typed in most referral searches.

A worked example

A business used a surname with an unusual spelling, which was distinctive and looked good.

Asked to spell it after hearing it, five people produced four versions, none of them correct.

They registered the two most common misspellings as domains, redirected them, and began describing themselves consistently as the surname followed by the trade and the city.

They also recorded a voicemail greeting that spelled the name out, which they had not thought of and which callers mentioned afterwards.

Direct traffic from the misspelled domains was small and steady, and worth considerably more than it cost.

Their conclusion was that the name had been fine and the assumption that people could spell it had not been.

Saying it consistently

A smaller point that affects whether it is heard correctly at all.

Agree how the name is pronounced and make sure everybody in the business says it the same way, particularly on the phone.

Where the name is ambiguous, say it and then spell it, which takes two seconds and is the whole remedy at that moment.

Do the same in your voicemail greeting, since that is a recording that will be heard by every missed caller.

And if you ever advertise on radio or a podcast, spell it in the advertisement, because listeners cannot see anything and have nothing to look at.

When choosing a new name

Since prevention costs nothing and the fix never fully works.

Prefer ordinary spellings of ordinary words, which are typed correctly by everybody.

Avoid ampersands, digits, and deliberate misspellings, all of which look better than they perform.

Say the candidate name aloud to several people and run the spelling test before committing to anything printed.

Check that it does not sound like an existing business in your area, which is a hearing problem rather than a spelling one and is harder to fix.

A name that survives being spoken is worth more to a local business than one that looks distinctive on a van.

Check what a phone hears

A newer version of the same problem, and one nobody tested for until recently.

People increasingly ask a phone or a speaker to find a business by name, and voice search has to convert what it heard into a query.

An unusual spelling, or a name that sounds like an ordinary phrase, produces a result for something else entirely.

Try it yourself: ask your phone to find your business by name, in the way a customer would, and see what comes back.

Where it fails, pairing the name with the trade and the town is again the remedy, since that is how people phrase a spoken search anyway.

The counter-case

Distinctiveness has value too.

An unusual name is easier to protect, easier to rank for once people find it, and less likely to be confused with a competitor.

Family businesses trading under a surname have a good reason not to change it, and the surname is frequently the reputation.

And a name people have already learned is worth keeping even if it fails the spelling test, since the recognition outweighs the friction.

Test it, register the misspellings, pair it with the trade and the town, and change it only if you are choosing a name anyway.

What to do

  1. Ask five people to spell it after hearing it.
  2. Do it over the phone as well.
  3. Register the versions they wrote.
  4. Check search reports for misspellings already arriving.
  5. Pair the name with the trade and the town.
  6. Spell it in your voicemail greeting.
  7. Run the test before choosing any new name.

Step one is the whole diagnosis, and businesses that run it are usually surprised, because they have never heard their own name from somebody who had not seen it written.

Fitting a long one into a design is covered in a layout that survives a long business name.

Frequently asked questions

Why does spelling matter so much?

Because most referrals are spoken. Somebody hears your name once, types it later, and if what they type does not find you the referral is lost without either party knowing.

What makes a name fail?

Unusual spellings of ordinary words, hard-to-spell surnames, numbers that may be digits or words, ampersands, homophones, and words that are commonly misheard.

How do I test it?

Say it once to five people who have not seen it written and ask them to write it down. Do it over the phone too, which is harsher because the line loses consonants.

What should I do about misspellings?

Register the versions people actually wrote as domains and redirect them. Two or three covers most of the loss and each costs very little per year.

What rescues a difficult name?

Pairing it with the trade and the town everywhere, and asking customers to recommend you that way. Those words are unambiguous where the name is not.

Should I change a difficult name?

Usually not if people already know it, since recognition outweighs the friction. Run the test before choosing any new name, where prevention is free.

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.

Never heard your name from somebody who has not seen it?

Ask five people to spell it after hearing it once. The versions you get back are what customers are typing.

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