Find out if your desired business name is free for you to use. Now that you’ve picked the perfect business name, can you go ahead and use it? Not without doing your homework first. You must make sure that you aren’t treading on someone else’s rights to the name.

 

To stay out of trouble, understand the basics of trademark law, which prevents a business from using a name that is likely to be confused with the name of a competing business. If you choose a business name that’s too similar to a competitor’s name, you might find yourself accused of violating the competitor’s legal rights (called “trademark infringement” or “unfair competition”), and you could be forced to change your business name and possibly pay money damages.

 

There’s only one way to ensure that you won’t violate someone else’s trademark rights: Do some digging to find out whether another business is already using a name that’s identical or similar to the one you want to use.