At its core, brand protection is the processing of preventing bad actors from illegally infringing on your intellectual property (IP). This can include your brand name, brand identity, trademarks, copyrights, designs, patents, and more. Do not wait for something horrible to happen to your brand. When you buy a domain, it is important to plan ahead to protect that brand name and the rest of your business.
Before diving further into brand protection, we need to discuss brand infringement and its effects on your business.
Brand Infringement
Imagine your target customer searching online for your product or service. Imagine they’re searching on Google, researching for the product. They’re just about to find your website, but as things sometimes go, they come across a fake website posturing as your own! They see a cheap knock-off product being associated with your brand.
At this point, they might buy the fake product, or they might be turned off from your brand altogether. Whatever happens, it’s not going to be a good outcome for your business’s reputation or bottom line.
This exact scenario can happen to any business, whether you’re selling vintage clothing, consulting services, artesian jams, or anything else under the sun. And unfortunately, this isn’t the only scenario that could harm your brand online. The list of brand infringement schemes is long and ever-growing.
Types of Infringement
- Counterfeit. The act of unauthorized manufacturing of copy-cat, knock-off items using your brand’s name or IP.
- Trademark. The unauthorized use of your trademark through the sale of any goods or services. This includes logos, patterns, etc. that make up your brand.
- Patent. The unauthorized sale of your patented product. This can include physical products or processes to make new products.
- Copyright. The unauthorized copying of any of your company’s work is protected by copyright. This can include audio, video, or other formats.
- Design. The unauthorized manufacturing of products using patented design elements to create a similar product.
Infringement Tactics
- Look-alike websites. Websites that use the same brand name to sell counterfeit items or other brand-infringing products. Many times, these websites are set up to imitate the look and feel of the real brand.
- Social media copy-cat. Similar to look-alike websites, social media copy-cats are set up to mimic a brand and redirect customers to their fraudulent websites or e-commerce listings.
- Phishing. A scheme in which hackers mimic a legitimate brand in order to steal personal data from your customers.
Enter Brand Protection
Brand protection is how you can fight back against the ever-growing list of brand infringement schemes. After all, you and your company created your brand and everything that comes along with it. And this includes more than just buying a website domain. Your company is yours to benefit from and yours to protect.
Brand Protection Strategies
- Social Media Monitoring
- Keyword Monitoring
- Advertising Monitoring
- Domain Blocking
For the purposes of this article, we’re going to discuss domain blocking as an effective brand protection strategy. Domain blocking is a type of service that automatically blocks registrations of domain names that infringe on your trademark. This can include exact match or look-alike terms.
AdultBlock
AdultBlock is a domain blocking service offered through Saw.com that blocks infringing names in the adult sphere of gTLDs, including .xxx, .adult, .porn, and .sex. As this article has discussed, the use of “look-alike” websites is a major infringement strategy on the part of malicious actors looking to take advantage of your brand. In the adult sphere, this type of infringement could be particularly harmful to your brand and its reputation.
Adult themed searches receive more traffic than Netflix, Amazon & Twitter combined together each month. Prevent rouge misuse and misdirection by traffic savvy operators by migrating to AdultBlock or AdultBlock+.
Benefits of Brand Protection
Implementing an effective brand protection strategy with solutions such as AdultBlock will provide companies major ROI benefits:
- Increased revenue
- Decreased “defensive registration” costs
- Decreased legal team and litigation costs in the case of infringement
More About Saw.com
The team of domain brokers at Saw.com has extensive experience in the domain industry. Saw.com is a team devoted to helping clients build their business and be seen online. Our professional team of domain brokers is experienced in all types of sales across a wide variety of industries. Saw.com expertise creates a unique, personalized experience through domain brokerage, appraisal, portfolio management services and more.
The team of domain brokers at Saw.com has extensive experience in the domain industry. Saw.com is a team devoted to helping clients build their business and be seen online. Our professional team of domain brokers is experienced in all types of sales across a wide variety of industries. Saw.com expertise creates a unique, personalized experience through domain brokerage, appraisal, portfolio management services and more.
