5 Things Every Brand Needs To Know About Trademarks

For beginners, it’s essential to establish and safeguard your trademarks right from the starting. Or else, you risk greater headaches down the road. For every business, trademarks are key brands. Your clients connect them with your enterprise and its reputation and they help differentiate your products and services from your competitors in a crowded marketplace.

Be it your businesses product, service, location or size registering a trademark is one of the most vital procedure one can take to protect and secure a brand. Trademarks protect your ownership and reputation of the unique marks and words that make your business stand out.

In addition to this, consumers decisions are often influenced through trademarks and the reputations such marks symbolize.

Following are the five things new business owners require to know about trademarks. Let’s have a look:

Your Firm Name is not Automatically your Trademark

In the method of incorporating your business, you were most often need to register a corporate name under which you would be doing business.

A corporate name approved as part of the incorporation process permits your firm to operate a business using that name within the province or territory registered or across the country, if checked under federal legislation. If your corporate name is not different to the name of your firm as it appears to your clients, you would have also needed to register the latter as “firm” or “trade” name.

One can File for your Trademark Before Using it

Until you’re using your proposed mark, you don’t have to delay your trademark application. One can file a trademark application on either of two bases in the United States. You might file an application for a mark on the basis that you are already using it in commerce or based that you intend to use it in commerce.

Make a note, that while you can begin the method depending upon the intent use, once your mark is allowed, you will require to demonstrate use of the mark to have it proceed to registration.

Your filing options are same and as of today, you also need to demonstrate use prior to registration in Canada. Although, the use requirement is being eliminated in Canada. You will no longer need to facilitate grounds for filing nor will will you ever require to prove that you are using the mark for the objective of registration.

You might, however, still be subject to a request from the Registrar to show use the trademark. The request can be made is three years following the date of registration.

Your Choice of Trademark is Concern to Limitations

You might already be aware of that you won’t be able to register a mark that is being utilized by someone else for the same or similar goods and services.

Although, as you invoke your trademark, you must also bear in mind a number of additional limitations on registrability. Few words, combinations therefore, or images will not be registrable rather than their availability otherwise.

For instance, you won’t be able to register a trademark consisting of a name or surname, a word in alternative language or a word or image that are closely signifying a prohibited mark in Canada. The next mark you cannot register is a clearly descriptive mark. A clearly descriptive mark explains a characteristic of the goods and services with which it is to be utilized.

Let’s understand through an example, you cannot register “hot” as a trademark for use with the coffee. This restrictions is in place to make sure that other traders are able to describe their products and services without being sued for trademark infringement. In a way to be registrable, a mark also cannot be misdescriptive in the sense that it is misleading to the public. If you’re selling small bottles of coconut water, you likely would not be able to register “Milk Shots” for instance.

It will be examined to make sure that is satisfied the needs for a registered trademark in that jurisdiction once you submit your trademark application. It doesn’t get to comply with one, the examiner will issue a report to that effect and the registration of your mark will depend on your ability to overcome the examiner’s objections.

Your time can be saved and money and one can boost the likelihood of obtaining a registration by being mindful of the needs of registrability before selecting and filing an application to register your mark.

Registration is Important

For few start up firms, trademark registration might not finally be seen as a top priority. Companies and business organizations might be reluctant to incur the expense having not acquired a reputation to protect, having limited financial resources. If you gone through the research work, you might think you can depend on the common law to protect your mark.

Federal registration of a trademark is not a prerequisite to protection in Canada and in the United States. Well, it is possible to depend on your use of the mark in the absence of any formal registration to invent your rights in both countries. You must be well-versed of the significant advantages of registered marks over unregistered marks.

Registered marks are easier to establish a right to and protect, whereas there is heavy burden connected with protecting unregistered marks which include the requirement to prove the mark’s validity and the scope of the asserted rights.

The upfront cost of registering your mark will pale in comparison to the additional legal fees that would be incurred if you require to enforce an unregistered mark in the future.

Make sure to Use a Marketing Notice

In every jurisdiction, using the trademark registration symbol is not importantly mandatory in every legal jurisdiction but it is always a good idea to do so anyways as you might be waiving rights must you forego its use. Let’s take an example; in the United States, failure to use an official registration mark limits the remedies you can seek in your civil law suit from infringers.

Keep Future Expansion in Mind

Initially, make sure to keep your planned future expansion in mind. However, there is another business using the similar trademark you wish to register, but they are thousands of miles away, clear across the country. In such situation, it might be an acceptable risk to continue with the dual marking. Although, if the other business is close and lies within a geographic region you however see yourself targeting, you might be quite literally blocked from future expansion by the already established business.

It is not difficult to find dozens examples of individual businesses failing to heed every lessons of these and making an end in substantial legal difficulty as a result. Functioning with a trademark attorney from the inception of your business will help you prevent these mistakes and place you on solid footing related to you intellectual property from the very starting of your endeavor . I have also explained about 5 common mistakes to avoid in choosing a trademark in my next blog. Read full article at iVeda Help and share your views via Comment Section mentioned below.