If you are just you, be you. Your name.

If you get famous at your craft, it will be under your name. Not under something like The Write Stuff. 

If you are truly a company, meaning you have nine or eleven or three people working for you, then bill yourself as a company if you wish.

But for what you and I do all day, your name is always better, even if you do run a company.

Andy Warhol had twenty or thirty people doing paintings and artwork for him. It was a company. But people remember Andy Warhol, not “PopArt Creative Associates.”

I know, the idea is, if you bill yourself as company, or a design studio, or a translation group, or a marketing agency, you will seem bigger, more respectable.

No you won’t.

I get emails all the time that say, “I’m Dan Melnick, CEO of Content Creations, Inc.” Of course, when I check out the web site, it’s clear there is only Dan and maybe a part-time assistant or dogwalker. Phony pretension. It ain’t fooling clients, either.

(Just for the record: Unless you have more than 120 employees you are NOT the CEO. When you have oh, say, 12 Officers, and perhaps four of them are Executive Officers, and of those, you are the Chief one, then you can anoint yourself CEO. Otherwise, it is a flatulent title.)

Or perhaps, it’s your goal to build a company some day.

Then wait till you build one. And even then, you’d be better off going from “Maria Sante” to “Maria Sante Studio.”  It will still be you, only bigger.

Or, there’s the notion that if you call yourself BatShit Crazy Design, it will be far more ‘catchy’ and memorable than using your name, which may be uninspiring.

Maybe. But all you’re doing is giving clients more things to remember, more things to figure out.

Better to say, “Stan Morgan, BatShit Crazy.”  Everyone will get that. And they’ll know exactly who they’re working with.

If you have a company name now, maybe because you did an LLC or Corp, or your country requires a business name, or you registered the domain name, that’s fine. Don’t worry about it. Use it on your official invoices, or government paperwork.

I’m guessing most clients don’t know, or don’t remember, that company name anyway.

They say “I work with Amy Lerner.”  “Hey, call Ivan Rabova. He’s good.”

Go with your name first.

Be you.