Trademarks help consumers distinguish between products and services, so they are critical for protecting your brand name. They also allow you to take legal action against others who misuse them. When you register a trademark, it provides more benefits than just these two things.
Once you have confirmed your trademark is original through a trademark search, there are benefits you will enjoy from the protection a trademark brings for your business name. This article discusses a trademark and how it protects your business name.
Trademark 101
A trademark is a word, phrase, symbol, or design that represents your brand. It is one of the most important for protecting your business and its products from being copied by other companies. It can also be used to distinguish products and services from those of your competitors.
Below are the ways a trademark helps protect your business name:
1. Prevents Copying
When you trademark your business name and logo, it prevents others from copying them. A trademark is one of the most effective ways to protect your brand and prevent anyone else from using it. It also allows you to take legal action against those trying to profit by using your business name or logo without permission. This can help keep your customers happy and build trust in your brand as an authority.
In addition to preventing others from copying or imitating a protected mark, trademarks also grant owners exclusive rights over their marks for specific goods or services within designated classes (such as clothing). This means no one else may use similar marks on competing products or services that would cause people to confuse them with yours.
2. Protects Your Slogan
You might not consider your slogan a trademarked asset, but it can be. A slogan is a short phrase or sentence that represents your brand and helps customers identify with it. It should also be unique to your business so that no other company could use the same one with similar products or services.
You may not have realized how you use slogans in marketing, but they are everywhere: on advertisements, websites, and social media posts, even as part of product names. Slogans help customers remember you better than just using a common name. They create emotional connections between them and your brand identity.
3. Secures Domain Names
To protect your business name and brand, securing a trademark is also essential. However, to register a trademark, it requires more time and resources than securing an internet domain name. You can register a domain name directly with the authorized hosting registrars available on the internet.
Domain names are often used as substitutes for business names in online communications and advertisements. Therefore, if you want to protect your business’s name from being used by someone else who is not associated with your company such as when searching online, you will need to register the corresponding domain names.
4. Stops Others from Stealing Your Identity
A trademark is a legal way to protect your brand name. It will prevent others from using your company’s or product’s name and even logos for their benefit.
Regarding protecting intellectual property, there are two general types of protection: patents and copyrights. Patents protect inventions or creations while copyrights protect written works like songs, books, and screenplays.
Trademarks fall into the realm of trademark law because they are used as symbols to identify products or services that have been branded with a specific name or logo by an organization that is applied for exclusive rights over this mark.
5. Creates a Strong Business Foundation
One of the essential parts of any business is building a solid foundation. This can be done when you register a trademark. A trademark helps protect your brand and makes sure it stays safe from any copycats or other businesses using similar names.
A trademark is also a way to keep others from using your business name, which could cause confusion in the market and lead to customers looking for you elsewhere. This way, your brand name becomes protected.
6. Boosts Your Brand Awareness
A trademark is also a great way to boost your brand awareness, which means that when people see the logo or slogan associated with your trademarked name or product, they will associate it with you and become more likely to buy from you.
Marketing your trademark can be especially beneficial if there are similar products available on the market. Because the trademark symbolizes quality and trustworthiness, customers will be more likely to choose your brand over others as your brand name resonates with their choice.
7. Keeps Your Customers Engaged
Use your trademark as a marketing tool. You can use your trademark to create a community, create a brand image, create a brand identity, and even create a brand promise. Every company has its personality regarding how its products are marketed.
If you are hoping to grow your business into something bigger than yourself, you need to ensure that every decision you make about this business aligns with the way people think about it, including their perception of the brand name itself.
Create an online presence for yourself and engage with customers through social media channels by posting regular updates that tie back into what is happening in the world at large.
8. Increases Brand Value
The trademark is the foundation of your brand. It can be a strong one that builds your business, or it can be weak and do nothing for you. The good news is that the most crucial factor in determining whether your trademark helps or hurts you is how well you use it.
The most obvious way to increase brand value by using your mark is to register it as a trademark and use it consistently as part of every communication with customers, suppliers, employees, and other stakeholders who interact with your company on an ongoing basis.
Conclusion
If you are a business owner, protecting your brand name should ordinarily be of topmost priority. You can use trademarks to protect your brand and business name. You might be surprised to know that trademarks are not just for the big corporation. Rather, anyone can trademark his or her name or logo so long as he/she does it correctly.
