--- title: What is a Snap Tortoise? author: George Mandis date: 2017-02-01 description: The case for spending maybe more than 10 minutes coming up with a name for my business. tags: post --- For ten years I've freelanced under a my web development and consulting business — [SnapTortoise](https://snaptortoise.com). The name was actually a recommendation from a friend of mine, because I thought I would attract bigger clients if I didn't operate under my name, and because a coworker of his had drawn [a really cool picture of a snapping turtle](https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/george.mand.is/images/snapper.jpg), though in hindsight maybe not a great logo. I won't claim it was the most thoughtful approach, but I'm sure names have been chosen for worse reasons. Probably. In my meager defense, I was young and figured I'd change it. Ten years later I'm still using that name, though I still sometimes think about changing it. In that time I've learned a few important things you should consider before naming your business: - Don't underestimate people's ability to misspell a word like tortoise. - When choosing an animal, consider that aligning yourself with something that is slow and prone to biting people may not the best way to broadcast your services... - ...but truthfully, after perhaps the first conversation, the name will probably never come up again, so don't sweat it *too* much. - If your business name consists of a few real words strung together that have nothing to do with your field, you may find yourself on the receiving end of some fantastic email solicitations such as this one: ![Turtle Tanks](https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/george.mand.is/images/turtle-tanks.png)