AFS-Inc (Advanced Formula Search) for PPC/Paid search and SEO/Natural search agency

Brand Defense

2008 – Google changes the trademark policy in the UK and Ireland to allow anyone to bid on trademark/brand keywords. Adverts still protected.
2009 – Google allows the US users to use trademark’s/brand terms in adverts if the product being sold is an accessory (again what is an accessory or not is not defined).

In our view this is the beginning of an unrestricted approach to trademark’s and brandnames. In addition,there seems little anyone can do to stop Google.

2010 – Google (March 2010) won its case in highest court in Europe: The European Court of Justice has said that Google can sell trademarked terms through its Adwords service. Therefore, this opens the possibility of extending its UK policy (anyone can use keywords) to the rest of Europe.
2011 – Google introduces new policy (speculation)…
There should be no restrictions to anyone using trademarks in keywords or adverts.

The threats are increasing:

You need to know and act upon:

Which of your competitors are bidding against your trademarked terms?
How many sites are masquerading or using false association to divert traffic away from your site?
How often are they doing this and how serious a threat is it?
What proportion of your brand’s advertising share are they occupying?
Are they outside normal commercial practice or just bending the rules?
If the latter how many are using your trademarked terms in their ads which is against Google rules?
How much traffic are they diverting from your site?
What are they using in their adverts to win the click away from your site – this could relate to price, quality, product/service features, or other angles

See Brand protection to find our solutions.

Affiliate issues:

How well or poorly your affiliates are supporting the capture of your brand traffic
Whether your affiliates are complying with your brand guidelines and whether your governance processes and procedures are satisfactory
Whether you need to build your own affiliate assets and what the commercial justification might be for doing so