
Ask HN: Burnout App Feedback - gloo
We&#x27;ve spent 3 years developing a software that should help startups manage all processes in a single tool [1]. We are close to launch, but not sure about naming.<p>What do you think about Burnout name? Will it frighten people out? Do you think the idea itself is sound enough?<p>[1] https:&#x2F;&#x2F;burnout.so&#x2F;
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dstik
I know you're only asking about the name but wanted to share some other
helpful feedback as well.

I usually worry about all-in-one tools being a combination of the most popular
features of each specific tool but not being powerful enough to perform the
job of said tool. To mitigate this, I think having full pages breaking down
each of those sections (instead of just paragraph sections) would be helpful.
I like these short summaries, but additionally linking out to full sub-product
detail pages would be very helpful. I wonder how each of these sub-products
compare to their full product alternatives and don't quite understand from the
landing page how interconnected they all are in order to make me willing to
forego certain features/functionality for the sake of data organization.

As an example: We use Pipedrive as our CRM - it has concepts like: User ACL,
Deals, Contacts, Organizations, Activities, etc. It offers visual workflow
automation, a robust API, and advanced filtering searching capabilities. I'd
like to see all of the features I'd get with Burnout's CRM to help me evaluate
the product before I'd consider switching.

Regarding the name: personally, as a founder/engineer, when I hear the term
burnout I think of the negative mental/physical/emotional state that I (and
friends/teammates) have experienced in the past - so the name puts me off. A
suggestion could be something like (warning: bad ideas alert): Startup
(another play on words - since this guides you through starting up) or
Blueprint.

It looks like you've built a ton of product here and I'm excited to see a live
demo and check it out myself.

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dmwallin
As a name it seems like it will suffer greatly from overlap, making it
difficult to find. If you search for "Burnout" it will be extremely hard to
make it a top hit. Searching for "Burnout startup" or "Burnout software" you
will get similar results and is prob still too wide. Searching for "Burnout
App" gets you a mix of Racing Games and Self Care tools.

I think given the SEO issue, combined with the fact that "Burnout" is
something you actively want to avoid in a startup makes this a poor choice.

I would also avoid comparing this with "Slack". Slack has both negative and
positive connotations. It also has way better SEO properties since searching
for "slack" without additional qualifiers was likely uncommon.

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thecupisblue
This is more a ShowHN than AskHN.

I like it, added myself to the list already. Love the name, you can have great
marketing with it. Don't burnout, use burnout. Articles on burnout and mental
context switching hell - burnout is the perfect solution.

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gloo
Thanks! AFAIK Show HN allows to post only ready products you can have acces
to. Burnout.so is not ready yet...

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mtmail
Not sure I would use theranos as example company, from wikipedia "Shut down
and liquidated; founder indicted for wire fraud and conspiracy"

The name sounded generic enough (so does 'Slack') but then near the bottom I
see "Experience your last Burnout [..] But seriously, please take care " so
now I think you really mean a wordplay mental burnout. One could also
associate a tire burnout, then the wordplays can be related to cars, being
fast, fun [https://www.wikihow.com/Do-a-Burnout](https://www.wikihow.com/Do-a-
Burnout)

~~~
gloo
Thanks! We thought Theranos would serve as an irony. Will think about it.

~~~
afarrell
In communication, it is better to default to being straightforward. Irony
relies on some amount of shared understanding, but you are trying to
communicate with strangers.

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nik736
If you want to be taken seriously you change it and also change the Holmes
example ;-)

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rajacombinator
It’s a fairly bad, but memorable name. It won’t make or break your startup.
But spending 3 years in development before launching will.

~~~
gloo
We are in private beta for 6-7 months, so not that bad. Also it took our
competitors 2-3 years before the first release as well, so it seems that is
not a huge problem. We hope...

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tablet
It's relatively funny, however negative connotation is there. It is hard to
predict the launch, but usually name is not a big deal.

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d--b
I hate the name, but it doesn’t really matter if the tool’s good.

Startups are sufficiently stressful, I don’t need to be reminded constantly
that I could burn out any day.

Something around moonshot would sound nicer. Or mission control room. How
about “Houston”?

Edit: just read the page, sounds like the tool is huge in scope, are you sure
you need all that stuff before launching?

~~~
gloo
Well, when you create all-in-one tool you have to go deep. Most likely we will
drop some parts before the first release, like CMS (it is not fully ready
yet).

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afarrell
I'm unsure if the name is a serious liability or merely tolerable.

~~~
gloo
We were inspired by Slack, it is somewhat negative as well. Also something
that is associated with startups.

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afarrell
Is slack negative? Generally a system with some amount of slack is resilient
and responsive. (counterexample: a computer running at 100% cpu has no slack
and consequently feels sluggish to use.) An organisation could reasonably
aspire to have more internal responsiveness and relaxedness about
communication.

What do your users _aspire_ to?

Not burnout.

~~~
gloo
I'd say in business context it is
[https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/slack](https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/slack)

~~~
afarrell
Even in the context of slacking off, it is something that individuals might
enjoy. When an individual imagines slacking off, their imagination might
conjure a game of ping-pong or a cheeky 4pm beer.

Whenever _I_ hear the word burnout, I think of serious mental health and
relationship problems, with a whiff of divorce and depression. Like, I'm
reminded of this blog post: [http://jessenoller.com/blog/2015/9/27/a-lot-
happens](http://jessenoller.com/blog/2015/9/27/a-lot-happens)

