Is Your Brand Safe? Here’s What You Need to Know

If you’re running a business, protecting your brand is all-important. A strong brand helps you stand out from your competitors and can help foster customer loyalty. When you have a strong brand, customers know when they’re interacting with your products.

And when you have a brand, it’s up to you to protect it. You need to make sure you have ownership of your brand. It’s also not a bad idea to buy up domain names associated with your brand or company name. Keep an eye on your competition and what’s happening with your brand name. And make sure you’re using non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) where appropriate. You can even brand a colout (in some instances), or if you are a well known singer a album title like Dua Lipa Radical Optimism.

Take Ownership of Your Brand

The first thing you need to do to protect your brand is obtain all of the legal rights you can. That means registering a trademark for your business name and logo, making sure your intellectual property is protected by copyright where applicable, and patenting any inventions you may have developed. 

Without these protections, your brand is vulnerable to theft. A competitor could take your brand logo, for example, and start using it for their own products. This confuses customers, who may think that the competitor’s products are yours – and that not only eats into your sales, it can damage your company’s reputation if the competitor’s products aren’t as good. While you can trademark a brand through use in commerce, this kind of common law trademark is only valid in the immediate area where you’re using it. It doesn’t provide national or even statewide protection. It may not even provide protection in your entire county.

Buy Domain Names Associated with Your Brand

A domain name is part of a web address that identifies the domain on which the page is located. It’s usually something dot com or dot org. You will only use one domain name to market your brand online, but it’s a good idea to buy up all domain names that are relevant to your brand name. They’re not expensive, and grabbing them now will protect you from future domain squatters who will buy these domains and try to sell them back to you for an exorbitant price.

Keep an Eye on Your Competition

Even if you have a trademark registered with the USPTO, it’s still your responsibility to protect it. The USPTO and the U.S. Copyright Office don’t enforce these protections. They merely help you prove that you are the intellectual property owner. You will need to keep an eye on what your competitors are doing so that you can bring infringement action against them if they infringe on your copyrights or trademarks. Once a month or so, go online and search for your competitors to see what logos and slogans they’re using. Use Google Alerts to track press releases and other news or developments involving your competitors.

You’ll also want to make sure competitors aren’t using your brand name in Google Ads. Allocate funds to protect your brand name in the pay-per-click (PPC) space. This will keep your brand name keywords in the top positions for Google Ads. Search for competitors using your brand name in Google Ads, too. You can report these advertisers to Google, especially if they are trying to outright steal your brand name. 

Use NDAs Where You Can

NDAs can help protect your company from liability on many fronts, and they’re especially effective at protecting trade secrets and other proprietary information. Not all of your valuable information is going to be registrable as a trademark or otherwise protectable under intellectual property laws. NDAs are especially useful when you’re hiring independent contractors, because it can keep them from divulging your company’s processes, practices, and clients to third parties who may be willing to pay handsomely for the information. However, your full-time employees aren’t immune to these kinds of offers, so you should make them sign NDAs, too. An NDA can protect you if a competitor wants to poach employees who are privy to sensitive information. And if an employee or independent contractor does share sensitive information about your products or company, you’ll at least be able to take them to court.

Protecting your brand is an essential part of doing business. You want a strong brand that customers find appealing and attractive. You don’t want customers who are confused about which products and services are yours or where they can get them. Do everything you can to keep your brand strong, so you can focus on delivering the best products and services possible.

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