Written by By Max Miller
The hardest part of starting anything, whether it be a YouTube channel or a small business, is finding a name that fits. Sometimes, people get a stroke of genius and come up with the perfect, catchy name everyone recognizes after the first time they hear it. For the rest of us, coming up with a name can be a longer process than we would like. In this post, I will lay out some of the important items to take into consideration when coming up for the name of your Let’s Play channel on YouTube.
1. Find a Good Base
A major part of a good channel name is searchability. Someone should be able to remember and search your name with ease. Most of the top Let’s Players on YouTube all have very simple, catchy, and unique names. Keep these themes in mind when constructing the name of your channel.
Think of your channel name like a house: you have to start with a good foundation. The easiest way to do this is to take your own name and build off of it. For example, my name is Max, so I named my channel Multimaxmil, using Max as the base.
There are plenty of reasons to not use your own name as a base, especially if you are starting a channel for more people than just yourself. For this, still pick a base word to build off of, maybe one related to your channel or yourself in some way. Some good base words could be a type of animal, a game you enjoy, or a something with some meaning to you. The name making process should be fun, so don’t be afraid to try something out there.
2. Add Some Flair
Now that you have a base, it’s time to start getting (shwifty) creative! Try adding prefix’s, suffixes, common sounding phrases, alliteration, and related words to add flair to your own name. If you are making a channel with a specific game type in mind, you can even relate the other parts of your name to them, like “Max’s Minecraft” or “Jack Gaming.” This part is really up to you, and is really your way to make the channel yours. Have fun with it!
3. Some Things to Avoid
Many times, if a name is taken, YouTube will suggest you add numbers to the name to make it slightly different from the name that is already used. This hits two big no-noes in the channel naming world: similarity and sloppiness. If your name is too similar to another content creator on YouTube, it threatens your ability to scale as a creator. If you make a name that is like someone else, then it may be time to scrap your first choice name and go with another one. The same goes for numbers. Unnecessary numbers in a username can cause it to look sloppy and unprofessional. Believe it or not, this can make people steer away from your videos. Avoid them as much as you can.
If all else fails…
Use a random username generator. It’s not personal, and doesn’t give you a cool story behind your name, but if you’re all out of ideas, this is a good last resort.
Check out this one: http://jimpix.co.uk/words/username-generator.asp
One Last Note
Once you have your name, use Namechk to see if that name is taken on major social media outlets. It’s important to have universal branding (which will be a whole post itself) across all of your accounts, so make sure someone else hasn’t already come up with your amazing name.
Link: https://namechk.com/
TL;DR: Making a name is one of the most important parts of starting your channel, so make sure it is unique, catchy, and your own.
Thank you for reading! Don’t forget to head to the comment section to discuss this post, or leave any questions.
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