Welcome back to our "Build in Public" series! In our previous post, we shared how conversations with our teenage daughter and her friends inspired GYST's mission. Today, we're diving into the messy, frustrating, and ultimately enlightening process of finding our identity, including the accidental midnight eureka moment that gave us our name.

Moneytizeme: The Name That Made Perfect Sense (To Us)

When we first set out to build a company that would help creators protect, monetize, and scale their content, we thought we'd struck naming gold with "Moneytizeme."

It checked all the boxes:

a) A clever play on "money," "monetization," and "me" as a creator

b) Directly communicated our value proposition

c) Was available as a domain (the startup holy grail!)

Business partners nodded approvingly during meetings. Investors didn't bat an eye. Fellow fintech and management consulting veterans appreciated the wordplay.

We were sailing smoothly in our B2B bubble, patting ourselves on the back for our clever branding... until we actually talked to creators.

The Brutal Truth: Creators Hated Our Name

"It sounds like you're just trying to extract money from me," said one creator during our feedback sessions.

"Way too transactional," offered another.

"I don't feel like this is for me," a third commented with a grimace.

The feedback was consistent and unavoidable: creators hated our name. While we saw a clever business proposition, they saw yet another corporate entity trying to capitalize on their creative work.

It was a painful but necessary realization. We had inadvertently named our creator-focused company in a way that actively repelled our target audience. Nothing says "we don't understand you" quite like a name that makes creators physically cringe.

Our daughter's teenage friends were particularly unfiltered in their assessment: "That's the most boomer name ever," one declared, delivering the kind of devastating critique only Gen Z can truly master.

The Pivot: A Perfect Time for Rebranding

When we pivoted our business model to focus on being an AI Chief Revenue Officer for creators, it presented the perfect opportunity to shed the "Moneytizeme" skin and find a name that actually resonated with our audience.

We dove into the rebranding process with enthusiasm, certain that the perfect name would present itself quickly.

It did not.

Brainstorming Hell: The Infinite Name Generator

What followed was weeks of what can only be described as naming purgatory. We generated lists upon lists of potential names that were either tootoo boring, too finance-bro, sounded like a mobile game, or made us think what does that even mean?

We consulted naming experts, ran polls, checked domain availability, and slowly descended into the special madness that comes from saying potential company names out loud three hundred times in a row.

Our whiteboard became a graveyard of rejected names. Our Google Docs filled with increasingly desperate naming conventions. We began to wonder if we'd ever find something that felt right.

The Accidental Eureka at Midnight

After a particularly grueling brainstorming session that stretched into midnight, we were completely burnt out. The naming process had become a nightmare with no end in sight.

"Let's just go to bed," one of us finally said. "We'll get our shit together in the morning and figure this out."

And there it was. The perfect name, spoken in frustration rather than intention.

Get Your Shit Together.

We looked at each other with the slow-dawning realization that we'd accidentally stumbled onto something that felt... right.

"GYST," we said simultaneously.

It was perfect: direct, slightly irreverent, and exactly what we were offering creators: a way to get their business shit together.

From Profanity to Brand Identity

Once we had our GYST epiphany, everything clicked into place. This wasn't just a name; it was an identity that perfectly captured our company's purpose and attitude.

We were offering creators a solution to the overwhelming, scattered nature of trying to build a business across multiple platforms. We were the tool that helped them, well, get their shit together.

The name worked on multiple levels:

a) It communicated our value proposition instantly

b) It had a conversational, authentic tone that resonated with creators

c) It wasn't trying to be clever or corporate

d) It could function as both a noun and a verb

But most importantly, when we tested it with creators, they actually liked it. Our daughter's friend group, our harshest critics, gave it the coveted "not cringe" assessment! The highest praise indeed from Generation Z.

The Domain Name Hustle

Of course, in today's digital landscape, loving a name isn't enough; you need the domain to match. And predictably, gyst.com and gyst.ai were already taken.

This led us to another round of creative problem-solving as we considered alternatives:

gystai.com

gysthq.com

wearegyst.com

letsgyst.com

We put these options in front of our creator focus groups, and the winner was clear: letsgyst.com.

Why? Because creators loved the idea of turning our name into a verb. "Let's GYST" became shorthand for "let's optimize my creator business," exactly the action we wanted our brand to inspire.