Are you planning to
develop your business? It is significant to have a unique and distinct brand
that’s recognizable by consumers as a sign of quality, trust, and satisfaction.
These types of brands that attract business profits on one side are vulnerable
to be infringed by others like competitors on the other side. Hence, a good
trademark strategy is vital to create a brand that is easy to sell, satisfies
the consumers, and maintains a distance from issues like Trademark Infringement. Trademark strategy can also help in
ensuring that a unique name or logo representing your business will remain a
symbol of your goodwill and reputation, instead of becoming descriptive of
specific products originating from anyone.
Steps to Develop a
Fruitful Trademark Strategy
1. Execute Trademark Search
In the brainstorming
stages of building your brand, a trademark search is helpful to determine
whether or not any confusingly similar or identical trademark that can
prevent Trademark
Registration in
regards to your product already exists. A trademark search, though, seems a
little bit costly for firms having limited financial resources, yet it can help
you in saving a lot of your hard-earned money that may likely get wasted on
rebranding products and services once they were launched or promoted. It can
also prevent issues like trademark infringement, and therefore, wastage of
financial resources on settling them.
One can conduct a
preliminary trademark search on his/her own. However, this type of search only
captures trademarks identical to your mark in most cases. Besides, it fails to
determine trademarks that have different spellings but the same sound, for
example – Life and Lyfe. Accordingly, it is recommended to seek the help of an
experienced Intellectual
Property (IP) Attorney or trademark solicitor while conducting a trademark search.
2. Be Careful About the Trademark
Registration Process
After being familiar
with the fact that trademarks can add a remarkable value to your brand, you may
get tempted towards obtaining Trademark Protection in India or other nations for every
symbol, name, etc., representing your business. Before proceeding, note that as
the trademark registration procedure is country-specific, obtaining and
enforcing several trademarks can be expensive as well as difficult. As a
consequence, registering every single item in the vast suite of your business
products doesn’t make commercial sense. Hence, Trademark Registration in India or any nation should always be
carried out after prioritizing trademarks based on the value they provide and
having complete information regarding how the process is carried out in the
relevant nation.
3. Market Your Trademark
The subsequent step in
the trademark strategy procedure is to publicize your Registered Trademark to consumers so that they
associate it with the satisfaction and quality related to your products and
services. Do you rely on websites and social media platforms to advertise your
products? Securing domain names and social media accounts will help in
preventing competitors from making profits by using the same or similar names
or accounts.
4. Ensure Proper Usage
One pitfall trademark
holder can fall into is condoning inappropriate trademark use by consumers and
influencers in the area, spreading the usage in vernacular. One of the best
examples of this is “Google®,” which was initially trademarked as a search
engine but soon became a common verb to showcase searching for anything online.
Although this isn’t always problematic for large brands; however, for small
ones, it can lead to disastrous outcomes.
How can you prevent
devaluing your trademark in this way? Ensure using your trademark protection
for generic products or services that you are selling or planning to sell.
Consider developing your marketing strategy based on the comparisons like –
Kleenex® is the softest versus Kleenex® facial tissues are the softest. Avoid
using your trademark in plural form instead of singular if it has been
registered as a singular term.
5. Fight Against Competitors
The aim behind
developing a powerful trademark strategy is to make sure that your brand is the
only one that makes profits on the goodwill and reputation you have created. To
prohibit trademark infringement, you need to notify others regarding your
trademark rights in as many as possible instances. For instance, if your trademark
is registered, then you should showcase your trademarked term with ®. On the
other hand, if it not registered, still you should mark it with TM symbol often
put in superscript to notify others that you’re using the relevant symbol,
word, or other as a trademark.
Wrapping Up
The precise trademark
strategy can create goodwill and reputation that will uplift your brand from
better to the best. Don’t forget that careful consideration and execution of an
appropriate trademark strategy is not just beneficial but also essential to
shaping consumer perception of your business’ products and services.
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