3 Reasons To Register Your Trademarks

Your brand is an important part of your business…whether you call it your brand, your name, trademark or logo, it identifies your company, separating you from your competition. Purchasing decisions are made based on brand names and its reputation. From your local grocery store or car dealership to your own business, a trademark is an asset that has tangible value. 

Even while being surrounded by branding and bombarded with promotional  messaging daily, I’m still asked by businesses why they should bother to register their trademarks. After all, if they are using their name or logo in business regularly, what more does registration offer? 

Here are my top three reasons every mark should be registered with the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: 

Reason 1: Trademarks Identify Your Business

In a crowded marketplace, your mark can make you and your business stand out from the pack. Potential customers see your brand, recognize your business and know its reputation. When your business is clearly identified, prospects are less likely to seek the competition because they already know who to trust.

The process of trademark search for a registration ensures that your mark or logo  is able to stand out from any potential competitors in the same space. The search and registration  process reviews all potential elements of confusion. By registering your trademark, you are protecting your company from any confusion with existing businesses in the space or others that may come up in the future. 

Reason 2: Trademarks Make it Easier for Customers To Find You

If you’re using your brand to promote your business, prospects will search for you and your business by your brand name. Through search engines and social media, as well as signage and mailers, your mark is front and center in building the recognition of your business to your customers. 

But what happens when a competitor starts using a mark similar to yours? What about the same mark, but in a different industry? Or maybe the same industry, but a few towns (or the next state) away? These are questions you don’t need to worry about with a trademark registration. A registered trademark gives you exclusive rights, and allows you to take action against third parties from using your mark, or one that is confusingly similar. You want your customers to find you, not your competitors. By registering your mark, you make sure that’s exactly what will happen. 

Reason 3: Brand Registry Can Protect A Registered Trademark

Taking your brand online to build awareness and sell products holds huge potential. But, if you sell products online, there is also the risk of third parties using a mark similar to yours to steal your potential customers. A brand that is secured with trademark registration has the first layer of protection against that risk.

If you use a third party such as Amazon® to sell your products, you have the opportunity for another level of protection. Most of the larger providers have some type of policy or brand registry where you, as the owner of a registered mark, are allowed to list that mark for protection. Amazon, in particular, will work to prevent unauthorized use of your mark, protecting you and your business (and their own liability).

Protect Your Business With Trademark Registration

Trademarks can be very powerful in generating customer loyalty, but only if you take the steps to identify and protect them. Make sure your mark clearly identifies your business, makes it easy for customers to find you and provides you with full protection online by registering  today. With over 20 years of experience in the trademark field, we can help you with your trademark needs, just ask.