The concept you need to understand the most when naming a blog is the marketing concept of branding. Your brand is your everything. Even if you don’t believe you have a definitive brand, visitors begin forming a mental image of your brand the second they first access your blog’s frontpage.
In the blogging world, your brand is heavily affected by the name you choose. Your logo, design and domain will also heavily affect your brand image but I will not go into those three brand elements in this post.
When it comes to naming your blog, the most important thing to consider is what topic your blog will be limited to (if any). This blog is obviously about blogging so, naturally, the title (Blogtap) is representative of that. If I ever wanted to blog about other topics (such as tennis) on Blogtap, I would not be committing to my brand very well and I would most likely be doing damage to my brand.
All blogs that are not personal blogs gravitate around a particular topic or niche. It is this way because of how the Internet works. Sure, you could create a blog about tennis and blogging. But the odds of finding readers that enjoy both tennis and blogging are very rare. So, if you want to reach a large audience, you should be careful about which topics your blog gravitates towards. That doesn’t mean you should always be broad and impersonal; it only means your blog should have an underlying theme that readers can relate to.
I chose blogging because that is one thing I am passionate about. If you choose what you are passionate about, everything else (like the business and marketing aspect) will fall into place.
Using abstract blog names
Some blogs (mostly humor blogs) are named abstractly. A prime example of this is I Can Has Cheeseburger. Can you tell what I Can Has Cheeseburger is about before visiting the blog? My guess is, unless you heard of it before, that you could not guess that I Can Has Cheesburger is about funny pictures of cats. The name is a complete abstraction yet it represents one of the most popular blogs on the Internet. Abstractions are powerful branding tools because they are not easily forgettable and, because of their unusualness, they are excellent attention grabbers.
Considering the SEO benefits of a well-chosen name
Choosing an abstraction may be right for you if you are looking to create a humor blog but it certainly is not the right choice for every topic niche. If you are looking to create a blog about gardening for example, and you want to gain a large audience from search engine traffic, you should consider how your name will affect your site’s appeal to search engines. Google (like most search engines) will rank you better for gardening keywords if you place the word ‘gardening’ more often in your blog posts. The word ‘gardening’ will appear more often in your posts if the name of your blog is “Gardening in Galveston.”
Using your own name as the title of your blog
Some people choose their own name as the title of your blog. This perfectly okay to do if you are looking to create a personal blog: a place where you can share all of your passions, feelings, likes and dislikes. But, if you are looking to pursue a particular niche, it is not wise to name your blog after yourself unless you are a prominent public figure and people know who you are . The exception to this is if you are an expert or professional in that particular niche. Then you can use your personal image as a tool to better your brand by giving it more credibility.
That’s all I have to say about naming your blog right now. In future posts, I would like to elaborate on choosing a domain name, design, logo and other things related to blog branding. Stay tuned!
