Archive for August, 2006
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Friday, August 18th, 2006
One of the trends that we intend to track is how trade-marks fit within the brand development process. To that end, we’ve created the list below to help explore the branding blogosphere. Do you have, or know of, a great blog that’s missing? Let us know by sending a note to Larry Munn.
Branding Blogs List:
- Small Business Marketing & Branding
- Seth Godin
- Strategic Name Development Blog
- Branding Ad Vice
- The Beyond Branding Blog
- What”s Your Brand Mantra?
- Brand Autopsy
- Brand Infection
- The Brand Builder Blog
- brandXpress Blog
- Stefan’s Branding Blog
- Whisper | Brand Strategy In The Real World
- WonderBranding
- Brand New Day
- Corante Brandshift
- Branding Strategy Insider
- FusionBrand
- Dave Young’s Branding Blog
- Snark Hunting
- Naming and Branding Meta Blog
- BrandNoise
- The Origin of Brands Blog
- Confessions Of A Brand Evangelist Blog
- Primalbranding
- Own Your Brand
- Wordlab
- ThirdWay Advertising Blog
Posted in Branding | 4 Comments »
Goliaths’ enforcement draws attention
Wednesday, August 16th, 2006
Google has been the subject of recent media coverage regarding its letters sent to media organizations warning them not to use its trade-mark as a verb. While the media reports suggest Google has lost its sense of humour and bloggers poke fun at the examples Google’s lawyers have provided as acceptable usage of the trade-mark, a principal tenet regarding trade-mark usage is being glossed over. Trade-marks are valuable assets of a business, the use of which must be policed by the owner.
As Google and its lawyers correctly point out, a trade-mark is an adjective and should not be used as a verb or a noun. If a mark is used as a noun or a verb, it risks being genericized and losing its distinctiveness.A non-distinctive mark is likely not enforceable by the owner against others.
Google’s tremendous success in building its brand is a double-edged sword. The GOOGLE mark is now so well known that its use has entered the everyday language – there are now dictionary entries in the Oxford English Dictionary and Merriam-Webster which list “to google”.
On a related note, Apple is also policing use of its IPOD mark – trying to stop “pod” from being used by others in association with their products or services, claiming such use infringes its IPOD trade-mark.
Large successful companies such as Google and Apple may be painted as “Goliaths” in their campaigns to ensure proper use of their marks or stop infringement. Given the value of their brands (see the BusinessWeek Online/Interbrand Top 100 Brands), it’s hard to blame them. In fact, their shareholders would skewer management if it didn’t take this stance.
Posted in Protection & Enforcement | 2 Comments »
Top 100 Brands
Tuesday, August 15th, 2006
It seems appropriate to kick off a new trade-mark blog with some commentary on the recent BusinessWeek Online/Interbrand Top 100 Brands 2006
Not surprisingly, with 7 out of the top 10 and 51 out of the top 100, U.S. brands dominated the list, though a bit less than I thought they would – after number 70, European brands clearly dominate, though the value of those brands is much less than many of the higher ranked U.S. heavyweights. Also, the methodology used by Interbrand necessarily led to a more international result – the criteria used disqualified VISA, CNN and WALMART.
Technology brands dominate the top 6 and then are more evenly distributed farther down the list. No Canadian brand even made the list. I suppose Canada could get an honourable mention for eBay at no. 55 – the founder of that business being a transplanted Canuck.
Probably the most significant thing to note is the actual monetary value attributed to these brands – a whopping $67 billion to #1 ranked COCA-COLA for example. Helps to explain why trade-mark owners and their lawyers are so quick to enforce any perceived harm to their brands.
Posted in Branding, Famous Marks | No Comments »