Intranet names: best practices, ideas, and examples

The benefits of a company intranet reach far beyond just internal communications! Having a great central hub can have huge, tangible impacts on your bottom line and your employees’ wellbeing. But if you still need to sell your team on all the benefits of an intranet, here are 29 of them! Now let’s dive into naming your company intranet.

Naming your company intranet isn’t necessary, but when done well, it can be a delightful way to add to your internal brand and build extra affinity with your employees. Don’t put too much pressure on it, though; it doesn’t need to be some magic word that perfectly portrays your company culture. But if you’re looking for a great nickname, here’s our approach to creating something memorable and injecting a little bit of added personality into your intranet software!

Best practices for naming your employee intranet

Before we start workshopping names, a few things to keep in mind:

1.) You have to be able to easily say it out loud. It needs to naturally flow as part of an in-person conversation because your employees are going to reference it on a regular basis. You don’t want it to be too wordy, difficult to pronounce, or just awkward to say. When you’ve narrowed down your list, try tossing it around the intranet name in a few common sentences, like:

• Did you see the latest update on [intranet name]?
• Go ahead and post the latest report to [intranet name].
• Why don’t you try running an internal survey on [intranet name]?

You can use different articles, too…you might find that the name works better or flows more naturally with “our” or “the” in front of it (Facebook, The Facebook, etc.)

2.) Don’t overthink it! Some of the most effective corporate intranet names are simple terms or first-person names. It doesn’t have to be a perfectly-crafted acronym or a cute mascot; it can simply be a word that resonates with you. You don’t want the adoption of your intranet to be tied to a long, convoluted name. When in doubt, Workshop will work, or something like [Company] One, [Company] Net, [First letter of company name]-web, etc.

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That being said, some names just don’t evoke any kind of emotion and also don’t flow naturally in conversation. Here are a few real-world examples we wouldn’t recommend, based on the best practices we outlined above:

• The Ship’s Logbook: Too long and doesn’t have a nickname-able version. Can’t imagine it in a casual conversation.
• InnovCenter: Kind of awkward to say, doesn’t roll off the tongue.
• You AND Me: Doesn’t indicate a name, would likely be confusing in a conversation to know you’re talking about the company intranet.
• My Global Source: Doesn’t flow naturally, doesn’t have a nickname-able version, doesn’t evoke any particular feeling or purpose.
• Hello: Another one that’s just too common of a word to use!
• [Company] Intranet: Totally fine to go classic with it, just isn’t really a name. 🙂

How to come up with a name for your company intranet

Get the company involved

You don’t have to name the intranet on your own! One of the best ways to get your company involved and invested in your new intranet is to run a contest to name it. Your employees might have some super creative ideas you haven’t thought of…just remember to provide some of the above guidelines so you don’t get a long list of totally outlandish suggestions.

From there, we’d recommend curating a shortlist of your favorites, and then invite the team to vote on their top pick!

Name it yourself!

If you’re a smaller organization or want to curate a list of ideas for yourself, we’ll take you through a process that we use all the time in coming up with creative intranet names.

There are essentially five main approaches:

1 | A meaningful term
2 | A synonym that resonates
3 | A practical name
4 | An acronym
5 | A persona or mascot

We’ll take you through each of them, and you’ll have a great name (or five) by the end of this article!

1 | A meaningful term

This is such a great way to incorporate your company’s unique culture, without going overboard. Consider your company’s values, its quirks, or things that your employees absolutely love, and curate a name around that.

You can also comb through common industry terminology and study your products/services…there’s likely something that will strike inspiration. Depending on your industry, the ideas could be absolutely endless!

2 | A synonym that resonates

When you’re stumped for an idea or inspiration for a name, we’re big fans of busting out a good thesaurus. Consider the purpose of your intranet as a place to start; often, they’ll be a hub, a newsletter, a social gathering space, etc. That alone can generate thousands of possible terms, like:

• Core
• Spotlight
• Limelight
• Axis
• HQ
• Home
• Port
• Circle
• Scoop
• Pulse
• Studio
• Club
• Lobby
• Roster
• League

You’ll likely find a term that resonates with your company’s industry and values, and can use it to put together a short phrase, or just embrace it whole-heartedly!

3 | A practical name

There’s nothing wrong with a clean, straightforward, easy-to-understand name for your company intranet! If you’re looking for something that just gets the message across, here’s a few ideas to start with:

• Connect
• Link
• One
• Central
• My [Company Name]
• Place
• ___-web
• i-_____
• ____net

This intranet name generator is also a solid resource if you’re searching for a more practical option.

4 | An acronym

An acronym can also go in any of the above or below directions (and can spell out a meaningful term or a person’s name), but keep in mind that it’s best if you aren’t trying to force it. 🙂

That being said, it can make your intranet’s name really easy to remember, and can have an underlying meaning that really reflects your company’s culture and/or your intranet’s purpose. It’s one of the most engaging options out-of-the-box, for sure!

5 | A persona or a mascot

One of the easiest ways to give your intranet that relatable boost of personality is to name it as a person or mascot. You can use a famous person or character, like Sherlock or Jarvis, or develop your own identity, like Siri or Alexa.

Another example: one of the most well-loved company intranet names comes from Pima Federal Credit Union, who named their intranet Dwight, one of the main characters from NBC’s “The Office.” For Pima, it’s been reported that this name actually did boost engagement and adoption rates for their company intranet.

(Note: these names don’t really follow the best practices we outlined above and can still be a bit difficult to naturally incorporate into conversation, but many times the novelty of the name or the mascot will win out.)

Here are a few to consider!

Famous characters or people

• Einstein
• Elvis
• Merlin
• Newton
• Diana
• Buzz
• Pippin
• Sully
• Dora
• Arya
• Quinn

Names of people

• Nancy
• Otto
• Arthur
• Dorothy
• Bernard
• Henry
• Alice
• Ralph
• Harriet

Names that could make great pets/mascots

• Milo
• Scout
• Buddy
• Dash
• Rover
• Fido
• Birdie
• Bunny
• Spot

 

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Launching & promoting your new intranet

Of course, building out your new intranet is only the beginning; you’ll want to make sure you’re utilizing your other marketing channels to launch and generate traffic to your intranet on an ongoing basis. Email is consistently the best way to do both! With an internal marketing platform like Workshop, you can create newsletters, announcements, and even full-scale multi-email campaigns that point to your intranet of choice. Not only that, but Workshop actually integrates with the most common intranet providers (including Sharepoint!), so you can push notifications for quick updates, new emails from the CEO, or the monthly newsletter straight to your intranet. (No need to copy/paste across multiple channels!)

The next step:

Learn more about Workshop and how we can help you create a streamlined internal communications strategy! Request a demo here!