how to check on llc name [Best Info]

Last updated : Aug 25, 2022

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have you ever picked a business name only to realize months and thousands of dollars later spent on branding product and merch that is trademarked and you can't use it at all or maybe you went ahead and settled for that social media handle that has about six underscores the year you were born at the end and got a dotnet dot biz because the dot-com wasn't available well in this episode we're gonna give you guys three tips and tools to check the availability of the names that you have chosen let's get into it hey what's up this Rene Marquez here with neon Tiger media helping small businesses entrepreneurs and side hustlers navigate the cold digital world don't get lost in the sauce my friends let's get into this episode number one is uspto.gov that is the federal government trademark search directory simply type in the name of the business that you're wanting to use and it'll let you know if it's trademarked or not now let's say it's not trademarked and you're considering should I trade market I think if you want to protect your brand and business at the federal level because you're gonna do big things throw in big places then trade markets about $200 on LegalZoom and maybe you can even find some legal services around your town and number two there is no specific website you're simply going to go to google.com type in secretary of state followed by the state that you live in and it should pop up right there and there should be somewhere around to search for an entity slash business name type that in and it'll let you know if it's already registered in the state or not now the reason I recommend doing this is the last thing you want is to be already knee high deep in paperwork with your businesses services setting you up with that LLC your S corp and it's not available you're scrambling last minute and you end up settling for a name that you didn't really want and number three my favorite name check dot-com this is how you don't end up with that good old dot biz net org when you're not even a non-profit and you don't end up with six different underscores and the year you graduated on three different social handles for three different social media accounts you're simply going to type in the name that you're wanting to use on this website it's going to let you know every domain extension that's available and not as well as the social media so let's say you typed in the name of the this you want to use and the domains not available in social media is not available well don't go into a panic frenzy and start trying to pick a new name simply try this example let's say it's Canon that you put in there try we are Canon now social media is available but the dot-com is available should you switch it again no hold on I think you're fine with taking all the social media handles if you're fine with that extension I mean you could choose something else example if you're lively succulents you could try lovely lively succulents at the beginning I know that's corny but you get what I mean I mean just try different things out and your domain same thing I think as long as your domain makes sense it's not too long and crazy but your social media is consistent on all platforms you should be good the last thing you want is to have three different social media handles underscores all over the place it just looks bad it's not good it's not consistent well that's it for today's episode I hope everything that we shared with you guys helped you if you need any help questions or maybe you have better tools that makes us a lot easier comment down below we'd love to hear from you we'd also love to connect with you guys on social media and if you're new here and you haven't subscribe go ahead and hit that button right there plus a little notification bell hit that it'll let you know every time we post a video but until next time don't get lost in the sauce

Thanks for your comment Mathew Vanwinkle, have a nice day.
- Lawrence Purkerson, Staff Member

hello and welcome i'm attorney thomas burton and today i'm going to show you how to see if your llc name is available now an llc also known as limited liability company is a great entity for many business owners forming a small business in their state i am an estate planning and business attorney licensed in wisconsin so i'm going to show you the process to see if your name is available in wisconsin but there is a process from what i am aware in almost all the states where you can form an llc all 50 states to search to see if the name is available before you file your application to form your llc so in wisconsin the department that handles these is the wisconsin department of financial institutions in many states it's the secretary of state's office so if you're looking for the government agency that handles llc's in your state i would google llc formation and the name of your state you could possibly put in secretary of state or also corporate name registry in your state but you want to go to the actual government website because that's where in wisconsin you can search for free and i believe most states now have moved to the online uh registration system so here on wdfi.org go to i want to search on the top left and then corporate records and you'll see that takes us right here to the search corporate records database and here you can search the legal entity name the date the entity type registered agent but you'll see right below it here in purple's name availability well it's purple for me it might be blue for you but if you just want to search the corporate records for the name availability this is the place to do it so let's go ahead and do a search here and i always suggest if you're working with your attorney or anyone else that you have three names in mind maybe your primary name and then a couple backups so i've done this before but badger best painting let's see if that's available in wisconsin and you can see it says no records appear to conflict with the name you entered although there appears to be no conflict final determination cannot be guaranteed so that exact phrase appears to be available but if you've watched some of my add your painting without the badge your best is already in use you see 2014 badger painting llc was formed in wisconsin and it's in appleton so you can't use badger painting and i'll just do one more example here in wisconsin the badger state badger is popular so if you search for bad day you can also see the badger company has already been taken but a less popular name like let's say john smith anything dad smith is popular but there appears to be no one no entity named john smith painting llc now that's the name you might want to go back to this or go to this advanced search where you can search by not just the exact phrase but using all of the words so you know before you are certain the name is available do some different searches like that one i just did there using all of the words that would be helpful because you can see what's out there for badger painting if you're considering using this name we've got a badger painting llc a badger painting comma llc but that was dissolved in 2017 badger custom painting badge of painting contractors badger state painting so that would give you an idea of if i'm looking to form my entity and call it badger painting what's out there because part of this is thinking about competitors as well if you're near any of these businesses like boomerang badger painting is in madison uh you might be advertising in their market and just not want a google search for their website to go uh someone searching for you to go to their website vice versa likelihood of confusion so think about that with your branding so part of this is legal what can you actually name the company and you can only name it a company that isn't in use now some of these that have been dissolved it's possible the department now would give you that name but just the caution i would consider whether you want a name some companies have bad publicity associated with them and so if it was recently dissolved like 2019 they might be gonna reinstate it by filing the fees or you know it could have on the internet some negative connotations and you don't want that associated with your new business if that's not really you so that's one example let's just try one more wisconsin painting here another popular name in wisconsin so you can see all the versions of wisconsin painting wisconsin's painting here someone has it in 2019 and there's different versions here bulldog central wisconsin so you can look through these and decide what you want to name yours now this is just using a popular name you can be creative and think out of the box when coming up with your name and that's how many great brands came up with their name and always can add words so you know you can do north west wisconsin painting especially if you're a regional basis and that looks available similarly badger painting might be taken but you could do northwest bad days so think about your brand where you want to operate things like that now in terms of the llc you don't have to name it if it's for a different type of entity and it you want it to be private not have anything to do with your brand you can just name it whatever you want you know you can name it bucky well that's a brand but let's say there's some uh your cabin is on forest road and you want to use that as the llc so look here's forest lake road so you can't use that but forest road llc might be available it looks like from this because if we just go back to the exact phrase there's no results so in general i wanted to show you how do you get to it and again i'll just run through from the home page here go to i want to search corporate records and then name availability to see if the name you're thinking about is available and if you're working with an attorney they'll run this search for you but before you meet with them it's a good idea to have your list down to top two or three names that you think would work and give it to them even if you did your search online and such and let them run a search as well make sure it appears to be available and then the final decision is up to the department of financial institutions when they examine your application your articles of organization you're proposing to file to determine if it's available but it's a lot better to just pick a name that's available before you submit and submit the articles using a name already in use as i showed you because then the department just has to inform you it's not available based on those grounds so i hope this video has been helpful to you as you think about forming your own llc if it has consider giving it a like and subscribing to the channel so more people can see and benefit from this information as well thanks for tuning in and we'll see you next time

Thanks Katharine your participation is very much appreciated
- Lawrence Purkerson

About the author

Lawrence Purkerson

I've studied digital preservation at Missouri Southern State University in Joplin and I am an expert in herpetology. I usually feel calm. My previous job was marine/port engineer I held this position for 28 years, I love talking about business and acrylic painting. Huge fan of Fetty Wap I practice football and collect fabric and textiles.