Is your company name trademarked? If not, there’s no better time to get that ™ in play. Until then, your competitors -- or any company that wants to leverage your name for their own benefit -- can legally (if sleazily) use your name and URL to attract visits to their own website. Read More:

1. Business Advisor:
Protecting Your URL and Your Name
How to keep bad actors from using and abusing your name and brand on the web. A three-step
primer on domain names, trademarks and having the recourse you may one day need.
by Petalyn Swart Albert
Is your company name trademarked? If not, there’s no better time to
get that ™ in play. Until then, your competitors -- or any company that
wants to leverage your name for their own benefit -- can legally (if
sleazily) use your name and URL to attract visits to their own website.
The fact is: It’s legal to use anyone’s company name and URL if they
haven't been trademarked. For background, think of your company
name and/or URL this way: If they aren’t “owned,” then they are just
words.
Several remodelers discussed various types of this abuse in a recent
thread right here on d5R (see the discussion here). As an SEO consultant, as well as heading up
marketing operations for the a remodeling company owned by my husband, I’ve researched the
issue extensively and have some simple advice for protecting yourself and your brand -- on as
well as off the Internet.
Step 1: Get Ready
You can place a ™ next to your name, logo and/or slogan at any time. It is not essential to
register your trademark through the U.S. Patent & Trade Office, although owning a federal
trademark registration does provide important benefits (as well as allowing you to use the ® for
registered). That said, even without a registration, you can establish rights in a trademark based
on your use of the mark in commerce.
I also suggest also purchasing domain names that are very similar to your URL, might be typos
or abbreviations for your URL, or are synonymous for your work and location. Have those URLs
redirected to your site. Do you ever think, "I wish I had shortened my URL to ..."? If so, and if
that URL is available, nab it.

2. For instance, the URL for my husband's remodeling company is www.seaconstruction.com.
Since his company had been around for some time when I began working on its online effort, I
focused mostly on purchasing "geolocal" URLs like sanmateoremodeler.com and
seaRemodeling.com. (I might have gotten SanMateoContractor.com too -- but someone is selling
it for $12,000!)
Also consider purchasing your personal name as a domain. For example, I bought Petalyn.com.
Not only does this give me “ownership” of the name, but it also gives me the advantage when
representing myself (not just my company). As unusual as my name is, in fact, somebody else
beat me to creating a Facebook page called Petalyn.
As for .biz, .net and other versions of your domain name, it's your choice as to how watchful you
want to be and how many domain names you want to own. That said, I do suggest getting
the .info and mobile versions, before somebody else does.
Through these steps, you have copyrights to your company name and URL -- and you have
recourse against abuse. Bravo! The major search engines don’t want copyright issues to go
unattended under their watch, and now you may call on them if needed.
Step 2: Take Aim
If another company is using your trademarked name in an ad, Google will likely notify you
almost immediately, especially if you have set up Google alerts (it’s a good idea to set these up
for your company name anyway).
In the event of a trademark violation, Google will suggest that you first try to resolve the conflict
by contacting the advertiser directly. When you have this discussion, document it. If the other
company does not comply with your requests, the next step is to enlist Google’s help in
removing the ad. See Step 3 for more on this.
Before you jump ahead, though, assume the best. I suggest that you avoid sending the full weight
of Google bearing down on the other company until you have allowed for the odds that a creative
and agreeable solution might surface.
An example might look like the following: Coca-Cola and Pepsi are each trademarked. If one
beverage goliath uses the other’s name in any marketing materials, you can bet that one of two
things has happened: Either one company is committing a major copyright violation, or the two
have negotiated for mutual advantages.
Step 3: Fire (If Necessary)
If you have contacted the other company to no avail, you can then release the Kraken.
Each of the major search engines has a complaint process that is fairly easy to initiate. Getting a
response may take up to several weeks, but if you have trademarked your name, the search
engines will not only remove abusive ads but may also impose substantial fees on the offending

3. party, or may even revoke their account.
Be aware that the ramifications of unethical practices -intended or otherwise - can hit a business
hard. Exercise your power with care.
Below are the links to the forms you’ll need to complete for Google, Yahoo and Bing, depending
on which server you found your name on.
• Google AdWords Trademark Complaint Form
• Yahoo! Search Results Abuse Form
• Bing/Microsoft adCenter Trademark Concern
Take care of your property -- and good luck.
Petalyn Swart Albert works with remodelers and designers on SEO strategy. Follow her at her
blog: You Can SEO Too. She also works with her husband at SEA Construction, in San
Mateo, Calif. Connect with her on LinkedIn. Email her at: petalyn@youcanseotoo.com.
This and all content is compiled in good faith by daily5Remodel. However, no representation
is made as to the completeness or accuracy of the information it contains.
published on daily5Remodel on June 8, 2011.