Your own name or a business name- help?!

Hello

I'm setting up a freelance venture specialising in simplifiying information (so mainly Plain English/accessible copywriting, with a bit of training/consultancy thrown in)

My options are to trade under my own name (which is pretty memorable!) or a business name.

My first thoughts, and personal preference, were that it would be better to give the impression of having a business, even if you were just one person operating it.

However, some people have presented the argument that trading under my own name would be more personal, and that my name is memorable, which would help.

Would knowing that you were dealing with a single freelancer trading under their own name put people off, do you think- especially big businesses? For example, would it inspire more confidence to think they were dealing with a business instead of a random, or is it more the quality of work etc that matters?

Any thoughts or ideas very welcome.
Thank you v much

 

I went through this same problem recently. I'm a freelance writer so my name is very important but I was setting up a small copywriting and translation company so I thought that a memorable business name would be just as important. In the end I went for the business name as it was easier for branding and marketing. But that is just my opinion. I got a great logo designed and everything seems good so far.
Personal touch I think is good but you can always have an About page on your website that has a nice photo of you and your own personal history. You can also sign off on blog posts with your name (assuming you want to run a blog on your site) to give it that nice personal touch.

Hope that helps but in truth it's whatever you feel comfortable with. You will hear hundreds of arguments for both approaches

 

Coming to this rather late, but I'd say it depends: is your name well-known in your field? If so, I'd say stick with it, because it's your brand. If not, then I think I'd be tempted to come up with a company name which perhaps reflects what you do.