MBA1554 Should You Trademark Your Brand?

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We get into all of that in today's episode as well as what is a trademark really? And does it really protect you? There's so much to cover, but today's episode is really going to focus on clarity to give you a clear understanding what a trademark is, if you need it, when you need it, and how it can actually improve your business. Let's get into it. Let's get down to business. Let's begin with the basics. What is a trademark? Well, simply put, a trademark is a brand. It's a brand name. A trademark will include the name of the business, a symbol of the business, or a identity that represents the business. For example, McDonald's and the Golden Arches are trademarked. You can't Use either of those. If you opened up a restaurant, if you started a new company and you wanted to call it Apple, and you wanted to use the Apple logo, an apple with a bite taken out of it, you can't do it. That image is trademarked. It's part of their brand. They own that image. They own that identity. So can you trademark anything? Well, not exactly. You can't trademark common words. It's very hard to trademark common names like Mike or Dave or days of the week. But in most cases, you can trademark your brand name, if, of course, it's not trademarked already. So why do companies do this? Well, a lot of people say it's to protect them so people don't copy them. So people don't have me too products with the same name, this is all true. But in essence, a trademark adds value to your business. It actually adds a monetary value. It's part of the intellectual property of the company. So if the company ever sold that trademark, the right to use that name and that logo and that image, which has popularity, which has recognition, that itself has real value. It's an idea, it's a concept, and it's a part of what you would buy if you bought a company. To put it simply, McDonald's has worked so hard for decades to make the Golden Arches recognizable. It's a recognizable symbol. When people see the Golden Arches, they think of hamburgers and McDonald's, Big Mac and all that kind of stuff. So there's a lot invested in their identity and in their branding. So the right and the ability to use the Golden Arches anywhere they want has immense value because of all the work they put behind it. So this leads us to the question, should you be trademarking your business name and your logo and your identities and your image? Well, it depends on how much you've invested in in that identity. If you're a new business, if you just launched and you have, you know, a handful of customers, you're really not a household name yet. You really haven't built a brand or an identity that has value. But once you start growing your user base, your customer base, and you have that identity, where you do have a brand and some momentum now, you really should be thinking about trademarking your business name, your operating name, your logos, your branding. Because now you got traction. Now it's actually worth you spending the money and the time and the effort and any kind of, you know, legal costs to trademark your brand name. Now, in the US at least, trademarks are actually defined in two categories. So actually, your brand if you're using that brand, that brand name and logo, it's automatically kind of trademarked just by using it. But there's also a registered trademark. This is the one that you actually register with the government, with the state that you're in or the country you're in. So why would you have a registered trademark where you have to pay for that one, which costs around $300 in the U.S. well, if you're a local business, you're not really worried about competition outside of your local area, because outside your local area, you don't really operate in those areas. So you're not really worried about somebod taking the same name as your store or your business or even your logo, because they're kind of out of sight, out of mind, and they're not taking customers from you. But if you are going to be a regional or national business and you're growing and you have a customer base, and if you have customers in an expansive area, this is really important because competition can be anywhere. And this would apply to, you know, E commerce or an online business. Now, mind you, trademarks, registered trademarks only are applicable to the country you have registered that trademark. So if you have a registered trademark in the US it's not really enforced in other countries. So as you grow your business, as you expand, you want to start looking at where are the places around the world that I'm mostly going to expand to, whether it's Western countries, whether it's certain regions in the world. And this is where you would strategically, you know, have registered trademarks, and this would add value to your business as an asset. But again, this is only important once you start growing and your business is really becoming popular. You're really being in the forefront of people's minds as a market leader or one of the market leaders, you're on your competition's radar. So in my opinion, this is what you should do as an entrepreneur when it comes to registering a trademark for both your logo and your brand name. When you're starting out, when you're validating your business idea and you still don't have any customers, not the time to worry about this. As you start getting customers, you should look into the process and see how much it's going to cost. And if you need a lawyer to do it, once it's your livelihood and you have business and customers that expand to more than just your local area, once your business is actually paying all your bills and that's how you live and you rely on the income from the business this is when you have to protect your business. Trademark it get it registered. There are some lawyers that could do this for $500. The trademark itself is around $300. And get it for at least the country you live in. Okay? As you start to expand into other countries and you're starting to grow your business and now you're becoming a business that not only feeds your family, but many other people's family that work for you, take a look at the other markets around the world that you're serving. Which ones are the most prevalent? The ones that are your biggest number of customers reside in. And go ahead and take a look at the legalities of getting a registered trademark in those countries. Big companies like McDonald's, they have a registered trademark in pretty much every major country around the world. But medium sized companies, smaller based companies that have a presence around the world that you know are pretty popular, for example the software or mailchimp, they have some trademarks in particular countries around the world, not every single country. Because there are many parts of the world that have never heard of mailchimp before. Email marketing is not a big thing there and they're not too concerned about it.

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To wrap up today's lesson, I want to address the fact that having a registered trademark for your brand and your logos and all that kind of stuff is important and adds value to your actual business and and the value of your business. But it's not the highest priority when you're getting started. Make sure your business is viable. Has traction is something that you're going to be able to do for a long period of time, and then it's worth investing. Then you're making enough money where you can afford to spend 300 for a trademark and it becomes an asset to your business. Thank you so much for listening. If you love what you hear, hit subscribe Right now. We're on every podcasting platform. Spotify, Stitcher Radio, Apple Podcasts, Himalaya. We're on them all. Just hit subscribe right now. By hitting subscribe, you get access to over 1500 business lessons in our archives. It's the only way to get access to our archives. So hit subscribe and thank me later. Before I go, I want to leave you with this. A lot of us kind of get paralyzed and don't really know what to do when it comes to all this legal stuff like trademarking and copywriting and registering certain things in our business, it helps to have a lawyer you can contact. A lot of this stuff is scary to us. And this is why I recommend, even if you're just getting started and you've launched your business just to have a business lawyer that you can email and ask for advice. Most lawyers that work with entrepreneurs, they're okay with actually emailing you. They're not going to charge you to answer a few questions. It's only when they have to do any work, like write up some documentation or review some of your terms or conditions or whatever it is, at least you're going to get clarity on what's important, what's not, what's going to keep you out of trouble. This is one of the best things that we did when we got started. We got to know David Liserbram. He's a great, great lawyer based out of San Diego, and we met him through a networking event. That's why it's so important to grow your network. And a great lawyer is really going to be shared by other great entrepreneurs. So if you know other people that are in your space, ask them. Hey, I'm looking for a great lawyer. Do you have one you want to recommend to me? Don't be shy. It's going to be a great tool, a great person to have in your Rolodex. Thank you so much for listening and I'll check you in tomorrow's episode. Take care. We've all been there. You hold on to a coupon, but forget about it and suddenly it's expired. Expired in 2012. Dang it. Fortunately, by switching to Geico, you could save about 900 on car insurance without ever touching a coupon. It feels good to save Big. It feels good to Geico.