Protect Your Brand With Federal Trademark Registration

Protect Your Brand Today

You’ve spent countless hours developing your brand and your business. It’s your vision. You earned it from time spent planning, developing, doing, and through your unique experiences. No one else could have come up with the exact thing you did.

But with success comes people trying to trade off on what you’ve built. When you create something of value, why should someone else be able to use it and profit from it? Your brand is your company’s identity and it is highly valuable. It should be protected.

Brands are move valuable than ever. As of November 2018, Google’s brand is valued at $132 billion, Microsoft’s is at $104 billion, and Apple comes in at a whopping $182 billion! How do these brands protect what might be their most value asset – their name? The most important, the most affordable, and the most necessary is federal trademark registration.

Benefits of Federal Trademark Registration:

• Exclusive rights to use your trademark

• Best ability to stop others from ripping you off

• Freedom to use the ® symbol to let people know the value of your brand

• Protection does not expire

Do you care about your brand?

You’ve developed a brand you believe in and your business is growing. What’s to stop someone from using your name, making a similar logo, or just copying your overall look and feel? There is only one meaningful way to protect your brand: federal trademark registration.

Federal trademark registration is nearly a necessity to sue someone, so a cease and desist letter is essentially toothless without registration. Plus, it also allows you to put that ® symbol on your mark – letting your customers – and your competitors – know the value of your brand. Only federally registered marks can have the ® symbol.

But what if someone copies you – and you don’t have the proper protection in place? Before you can make any claim they are ripping you off you’ll have to prove that you own the exclusive rights to your brand. Without registration, this is expensive and, in my opinion, almost impossible. So, you might send a cease and desist letter, but since don’t have a registration, the infringer is going to just discard it. Their lawyer will say, “tell them to come back when you have a registration.”

Next, while you may have filed for your company name (LLC or Inc.) or even obtained a trade name, DBA, or a fictitious name – none of these will protect you from someone ripping off your brand name. These are corporate concepts and only a registered trademark will protect you. Even a state trademark registration will only protect you within your state. For most businesses federal trademark protection is THE MOST important step to protecting your brand.  

Services We Provide

• Thorough search and evaluate your trademarks

• Full registration services

• Honest advice tailored to YOUR business needs

• Enforcement of your trademark rights

Can you afford to wait?

So, you’ve decided to protect your brand. But wait – someone already has a registration that is too similar to yours – blocking you from getting protection. What can you do? You can spend $50-200k trying to get rid of the registration in your way, if it’s even possible. Or you might just have to change your name – a total rebrand. Another outcome that costs you time, money, and relevance in the market.

And this happens to companies all the time. I once had a client that waited to get a registration – all while it was building its business for 10 years, hiring 200 employees, and doing $2m in revenue per year. Someone came along and filed for a trademark that was similar to their name – not even exactly the same – but once our client finally decided to file for protection it was too late. Another company with very little market share had obtained a registration for a similar mark and services (not even the same mark and services – just similar!), but the USPTO felt it was too similar and rejected my client’s mark even though they had been using it far longer.

It doesn’t happen just to startups either. I worked for a company that loved to tout its status on the Fortune lists. Everyone knows this company and their trademarks. However, just like the previous example, they missed protecting the brand for one of their business lines once, even though they were using their name first in that market, because someone else obtained a registration first. So, what happened? After spending hundreds of thousands of dollars they were able to get the trademark they should have had all along. The cost if they had gotten it early on? Likely under a thousand dollars. Waiting to protect – or even worse, not protecting your brand at all – can cost you dearly in the long run.

The solution is simple – get your trademarks registered early. If you care about your brand, it is the only way to make sure you can stop people from copying you and confusing your customers.

Do you want your registration done right – and for a reasonable price?

The attorneys at Anthony Law have experience obtaining federal trademark registrations for all size and manner of businesses. From large insurance and financial companies to startup software companies. We know the pitfalls and difficulties of differing markets. No two trademark registrations are the same and we have the experience to advise you on the best path.

Foremost, we are business attorneys and we know that understanding your business is the first step – always. From there we can advise you on the strength of your trademark and on the best strategy to get the most protection. We understand what it takes to get protection and will advise you on the best way to obtain it.

Even more – if you pick a name and we think that registration would be difficult, or even worse, that continuing to use the name could lead to you receiving a cease and desist letter – WE WILL TELL YOU and figure out what to do. There are many options and we are experienced in helping to find alternative trademarks, knowing when the risk of continue use is warranted, and in all manner of disputes.

You might also choose to do it yourself and I get it. You’re smart. You’re motivated. You’re an entrepreneur. You figure it out and you get things done. And in my experience, I know that trademark concepts are not rocket science – however – there are thousands of tiny little concepts all affecting each other. The only way to learn them all is through experience. You might spend 10 hours or more figuring how to do a basic search and file your application. Then a few months later, you get a response from the USPTO that requires another 8-10 hours. An experienced trademark attorney will know the pitfalls that could await your mark and make the process much simpler – avoiding potential issues upfront. If you get the right attorney, you will save both time and money and end up with the best results – a fully valid fully enforceable U.S. federal trademark registration.

The skill of obtaining federal trademark protection is not something you are born with. It’s not like athletic ability and there is no innate knack for understanding what trademark examiners want to see on the applications. It’s learned from consistent and broad experience in the practice.

When you call us you will speak to an experienced trademark attorney and we will take the time to learn about your business and brand and advise you on what YOU should do, with no other goals in mind. And initial consultations are completely free!

Call 614-340-0011 today for a complimentary consultation and find out if your trademark is ready for protection.