So, you have a brilliant idea for a blog. You’ve identified your blog’s niche and target audience, you know exactly what kind of content you want to produce, and now you’re working on getting your blog started and looking for the best web host. There’s just that one problem that has you stumped: how to come up with a blog name.
Coming up with a name for your blog can be a surprisingly difficult task. After all, your blog’s name is the first impression viewers will get, so it has to be unique and memorable (in a good way). It should also give a clear idea of what kind of blog it is and of what visitors can expect to find.
And, with more than 600 million blogs active on the internet as of 2024, it should also be a name that helps you stand out from the (very, very large) crowd.
With so many expectations riding on just a few words, choosing a name for your blog can feel daunting.
But never fear – this article will offer you a handy guide on how to come up with a good blog name that you can be proud of.
Summary: How to Come Up With a Great Name for Your Blog
- Consider relevant keywords in your niche and research other successful blogs that cover similar topics for inspiration.
- If you’re still stumped, try using a domain name generator or creating a mind map to get your creative juices flowing.
- If all else fails, try entering keywords into a domain name generator.
- Once you’ve come up with a name, make sure that there is a matching (or very close) domain name available for sale.
How to Choose a Name for Your Blog
Without further ado, let’s take a look at how you can come up with a great, memorable name for your blog.
Consider Your Niche
It goes without saying, but your blog’s title should match your niche and give your audience a clear idea of what kind of content they can expect to find in your little corner of the internet.
To make your title unique and stand out from the competition in your niche, you don’t want to make the name too broad. Something like “Travel and Food,” for example, lacks originality and will return millions of search engine hits.
However, you also don’t want to be too specific since this can unintentionally paint you into a corner. Considering both the short-term and long-term goals of your blog is a good way to avoid this pitfall.
For example, let’s say you want to come up with a fashion blog name. You might decide that your blog will focus on shoes at first, but in the future, you might want to branch out into other areas of the fashion industry as well.
Calling your blog “These Boots Are Made for Blogging” is a fun title, but it might be a little narrow.
Look at Other Blogs in Your Niche
Wondering how to come up with a mom blog name?? Or maybe your niche is vegan cooking, and you want to know how to come up with a food blog name? Whatever kind of blog you want to start, chances are others have already done something similar (as they say, there’s nothing new under the sun).
But don’t let that thought depress you: in fact, you can view it as an opportunity. Instead of needing to invent something entirely new, you can check out what works (and what doesn’t) for other bloggers in your field and use it as inspiration to create something even better.
This goes for both content and blog names. For example, if you want to start a blog about the ups and downs of parenting, you can check out other parenting blogs’ titles for inspiration. Some of the most popular parenting and “mommy” blogs in 2024 are:
- Honest Mum
- Scary Mommy
- Motherly (which cleverly uses the domain name mother . ly)
- The Fashionable Housewife
- Alpha Mom
- Rage Against the Minivan
You’ll notice that most of these use some version of the word “mom,” giving their audience a clear idea of what to expect from their content.
Another option is to do what Kristen Howerton of Rage Against the Minivan did and go in a funny yet still topically-related direction (since minivans are the most stereotypical “mom” car).
Brainstorm Around Keywords
If you already know your niche and have a basic idea of what kind of content you want to blog about, then you have all the inspiration you need to come up with a great name.
Think about keywords or terms that came up repeatedly while doing your research into other blogs in your niche. There are online tools to help you compile lists of relevant keywords, but you can also compile your own lists based on your observations.
Remember your high school writing class? Your teacher may have asked you to make “mind maps,” or terms and words that come to mind when given a particular keyword as a prompt. This is another great technique for coming up with your blog name.
Write your central topic down in the middle of a piece of paper, and then write whatever else comes to your mind branching off around it.
For example, let’s say you want to figure out how to come up with a travel blog name. Logically, your mind map would start with the word “travel.”
Maybe you want to focus on how to travel in style on a budget, so you would then add the words “style” and “budget,” or maybe “elegant.”
One fantastic tool for mind mapping around keywords is thesaurus.com. Simply enter a word, and you’ll get a handy list of all synonyms and related terms.
For example, a search for the word “delicious” turns up such great results as “delectable,” “delightful,” and “enticing.”
Studies have actually shown that getting out a pen and paper and physically writing things down improves brain functioning and creativity.
In other words, if you take the time to make a mind map, in the end, you’ll have a list of nouns, verbs, and adjectives that you can combine to create a fun, catchy title for your blog.
Play With Language
Just like some songs get stuck in your head and refuse to leave, certain titles are catchier than others.
Making your title memorable may seem like a difficult task, but there are a few tried-and-true language conventions that you can use to ensure that your blog’s name is as catchy as the top 50 on the radio.
Alliteration, or the repetition of similar consonant and vowel sounds, is one way to do this. For example, the exercise blog Pilates for the People is memorable because of the alliterative “p” sound.
Another great example of alliteration is the parenting and lifestyle blog Foster the Family.
You can also consider creating a portmanteau. This is when you combine two words to make a new word.
One excellent example of this is the exercise and lifestyle guru Cassey Ho, who created the name of her wildly popular blog “Blogilates” by combining the words “blog” and “pilates.”
The name is fun, catchy, and immediately gives you an idea of what kind of content you’ll find on her blog.
As any popular song makes clear, humans love rhyming words. As such, playing with rhyme schemes is a great way to make sure that your blog’s title is memorable.
Even slant rhyme – words that almost rhyme but don’t quite – can be super effective. The cooking blog “Smitten Kitchen” is a great example of slant rhyme making for a memorable title.
Finally, you can try using a common saying or phrase in your title. A great example of this is the popular cooking blog “Two Peas & Their Pod,” which is a play on the English saying “two peas in a pod.”
There’s plenty of room for creativity in the English language, so have fun with it!
Use a Domain Name Generator
If you’re feeling stuck and in need of some computer-generated brainstorming, try using a domain name generator. As an added bonus, this also answers the question of how to come up with a domain name for your blog.
As I’ll get into in the next section, it’s important to make sure that your blog’s name matches the domain name of your site as closely as possible.
Here’s how to come up with a blog name by using a domain name generator.
You can find many different domain name generators around the internet for free, one of the most popular of which is GoDaddy. Simply enter a few keywords related to your blog’s topic, and see what comes up.
Match Your Blog’s Name to Its Domain Name (Very Important!)
Once you’ve settled on a few options for your blog’s name, it’s absolutely essential to check if they are available as a domain name.
Your blog’s domain name is its official address, and it can look unprofessional and downright weird if a blog’s name doesn’t match its domain name.
If the two names are closely related, it may not be a big deal. For example, a blog titled “Kiera Cooks” could have the domain name cookwithkiera.com without raising too many eyebrows. However, as a rule of thumb, it’s best to have your blog’s name match its domain name as closely as possible.
This is why it’s important to come up with a few options for your blog’s name and not get too attached to one before you’ve checked if it’s available.
To check if a domain name is available (and to see how much it costs), you can use a domain registrar such as GoDaddy, Bluehost, or Namecheap.
Domain registrars will include a lookup tool that allows you to search for your desired name and see if it’s available for sale.
For example, when I entered “kieracooks.com” into Bluehost’s domain name search tool, Bluehost informed me that it was indeed available for purchase and would’ve cost me a total of $24.97 ($12.99 for the domain, plus $11.88 for Bluehost’s optional Domain Privacy & Protection package) per year.
It also offered me a range of closely related alternatives that I could choose from, such as “kieracooks.org.”
If the name you’ve chosen for your blog doesn’t closely match any available domain names, it’s best to reconsider and go with a different name.
Why? Well, in addition to wanting your domain name to match your blog’s name as closely as possible, if all matching domain names are taken, then it means that the blog name you’ve chosen is too common!
A blog with a name that produces too many search engine results will have a much harder time standing out from the crowd.
Don’t Be Afraid to Think Outside the Box
Sometimes it’s good to get a little weird. Although it’s generally a good idea to give your blog a name that makes it easy for viewers to identify what kind of content they’ll find on your site, you can also throw out the rule book and let your inner weirdness shine.
Blogs with odd names are often memorable because they stand out from the crowd, which can be the key to success. Perhaps the most obvious example of this is Goop, Gwyneth Paltrow’s wildly popular lifestyle blog-turned-brand.
Goop has become a small lifestyle-and-wellness empire for its founder (of course, the fact that she was already famous before starting Goop helped), but you would never guess from the name alone what you will actually find on the site.
Inspiration: Examples of Great Blog Names
To round out this guide, here are a few more examples of great blog names that have helped propel their creators towards success.
- A Cup of Jo (lifestyle, food, and fashion)
- Good Financial Cents (personal finance and money)
- Budget Bytes (lifestyle and cooking on a budget)
- All Groan Up (personal finance and the difficulty of “adulting”)
- Gimme Some Oven (cooking)
- Lovicarious (travel and adventure)
- How Sweet Eats (cooking and food)
Remember that these are just inspiration – in order for your blog to stand out from the crowd, its name and content have to be uniquely your own.
The Bottom Line: How to Come Up With an Awesome Name for Your Blog
Running a successful blog is a labor of love that requires a lot of hard work, and finding the right name is just the first step.
You can start by looking at what works for other successful blogs in your niche, then identify keywords and use tools like thesaurus.com and/or domain name generators as additional sources of inspiration.
To make your blog’s name memorable (and more likely to rank highly on Google’s page rank), consider playing around with puns, rhyming words, and alliteration.
In the end, there’s no one-size-fits-all way to come up with the perfect name for your blog. If you’re still feeling stuck, try going out for a walk and/or giving yourself a few days to think it over – you never know when inspiration might strike!