Today, the Internet is a democratic force and an industry of information propagation. It is also the ideal space for plagiarism, copyright infringement, and libel. In the online environment, it is difficult to fully understand the legal framework and how it works, but not impossible.
In the context of a digital-centric economy, the potential of a business is determined by the intellectual property on the brand, but also by branding. Due to the fact that industrial property is one with an intangible substance, businesses tend not to take into account the importance of protecting their constituent elements. And yet, what is a trademark and why is it important for a business to be aware of the importance of its registration?
What is a trademark?
The brand is the most important commercial symbol of a brand and the first with which the public comes into contact, whether it is the logo, packaging or formula of a product. For marketing, it is a powerful, independent, persuasive, and autonomous communication tool in terms of success. The trademark applies, in particular, to brands, therefore to intangible goods, and its registration is one of the most important processes carried out within a company.
All distinctive signs, capable of being graphically represented, which make it possible to identify and distinguish goods in the same category are considered to be trade marks. These include letters, numbers, words, drawings, people’s names, figurative designs, three-dimensional shapes of products, packaging, color combinations, sounds, and olfactory marks. Currently, the registration of a trademark is done at the State Office for Inventions and Trademarks (OSIM) through an industrial property agency, and then it can also be done at Google. Registering your trademark with Google gives you absolute control over its use by imposing restrictions.
Why is it important for your trademark to be registered?
A registered trademark is an advantage over the competition, preventing counterfeiting or piracy activities. By becoming legally privately owned, the brand offers the exclusive right to benefit from the financial advantages that a brand offers. With the help of a registered trademark, business objectives are much easier to achieve. It is ideal for the brand to be secure from all points of view, so prevention supports the achievement of all the objectives set by the company.
As mentioned before, the trademark is a powerful communication tool, but an unregistered trademark is an incomplete tool. Operating with such tools is deficient and subjects the brand to a significant number of risks, such as the theft of name, image or product. It is critical for a company to operate with unreliable techniques, strategies and tools, which create confusion regarding the association between brand and products or services at the level of the collective mind. By using an unregistered trademark, the brand and all content elements under its umbrella are subject to reproduction, distribution, derivation, publication, sale or transfer. Therefore, an unregistered trademark is an incomplete tool that hinders the evolution of the brand and, implicitly, of the business.
All factors in the online environment define digital marketing as a field full of challenges, but it is the duty of each company to act responsibly from all points of view so that the hybrid tools with which it operates serve optimally to meet its objectives.
