Is Your Trademark Safe on Google?
Recent Changes
Google trademark policy in their AdWords ad-serving system is changing in a big way beginning in June. In a big turnaround from previous policy, Google will begin allowing advertisers to use trademarked terms within their paid search creative copywriting in many countries around the world. The previous Google Adwords policy was that if proper trademark paperwork was not filed with Google for a specific trademarked term, any advertiser could both bid on and/or use the trademarked term in their ad text. However, if trademark paperwork was filed with Google with regards to a specific trademarked term, the trademark owner could control who used the trademarked term in their creative ad copy. This will no longer be the case.
Here’s a direct quote from Dan Friedman written on an official Google site:
“We are adjusting our trademark policy in the U.S. to allow some ads to use trademarks in the ad text. This change will bring Google’s policy on trademark use in ad text more in line with the industry standard.”
Google is allowing use of protected trademarks in the ad text in the following circumstances:
- Ads which use the term in a descriptive or generic way, and not in reference to the trademark owner or the goods or services corresponding to the trademark term.
- Ads which use the trademark in a nominative manner to refer to the trademark or its owner, specifically:
- Resale of the trademarked goods or services
- Sale of components, replacement parts or compatible products corresponding to a trademark
- Informational sites: The primary purpose of the advertiser’s site must be to provide non-competitive and informative details about the goods or services corresponding to the trademark term
What Does this Mean for Trademark Owners?
Trademark / Brand Equity protection online is important. With this change, it will become more difficult to protect that brand equity or police how your trademark is being presented to searchers. For that reason, there are a few things you should consider:
- Now more than ever, it becomes increasingly important for your ads and trademark to be present within the results – this will help ensure that you’re giving searchers the option to click on your “official” listing
- Policy changes could increase the cost-per-click of your branded terms, as there could likely be an increased number of advertisers bidding on these terms
- Your organic (SEO) ranking may become more important, as the use of trademarked terms in paid search ad text could create some level of confusion among searchers as to where the “official” listing is located
Trademarks in the Display URL
One aspect that will not be changed in June is Google’s policy on the use of trademarked terms within the display URL. With all of the concern around trademarked terms, why isn’t Google reviewing the use of trademarked terms in the display URL?
Here is their official policy:
“We investigate the use of trademarks in ad text, namely, the first three lines of a standard text ad. Although display URLs are subject to our editorial guidelines, we don’t investigate display URLs in response to trademark complaints because the presence of trademarked term within a URL may not necessarily constitute trademark use, such as in the case of post-domain paths or subdomains.
If you object to the use of your term in a display URL, we encourage you to contact the advertiser directly about your concern. Google cannot be the arbiter of third-party disputes, and in addition, the advertiser may have similar ads running through other advertising programs.”
The reasoning here is that Google is not in a position to dictate the way that a company structures their website. So, if a toy reseller has a page dedicated to LEGO’S, they would most likely name that page www.toyreseller.com/LEGO or www.lego.toyreseller.com in order to achieve the best site architecture possible.
However, if Google were to enforce a trademark policy on display URL’s, the above advertiser would not need to change their site structure to conform, they could simply use www.toyreseller.com as the display URL.
Under the current policies, advertisers are taking advantage of the fact that there is no trademark review in the display URL. As a result, the advertiser can show a trademarked term (which gets highlighted in bold) for added relevance within the results.
Note that in the screenshot below of paid search results for a trademarked term ‘Actonel,’ 4 out of the top 6 listings use the trademarked term in the display URL:
So we know it is possible policy to capitalize on another brand’s trademark brand equity through this loophole in the AdWords display URL. However, just because it can be done, does that make it OK to do? Please comment with your thoughts on the subject – we’d love to hear your thoughts. Do you think there should be additional trademark policies enforced on the display URL?
To get a better understanding of how these new policies will matter, read more about the history of Google’s AdWords trademark policy.
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