Securing Trademark Registration is only the first step in building your brand. To protect your identity, you must take proactive steps, monitor how your competitors and other parties are using or registering similar marks.

Competitor Trademark Monitoring

Monitoring competitor trademarks is a labor-intensive and not so straightforward task, which involves periodically and actively searching for potential infringers using identical or similar trademarks. This isn’t just a defensive tactic; it can be a vital source of competitive intelligence. This procedure keeps an eye on trademark applications as they are filed, advertised, and accepted, so you don’t have to worry about any other business is infringing on the goodwill you have developed. You are also able to track your competitors in your industry, learn about new entrants, and understand their new products or expansions into your market with competitive intelligence. Tracking trademark registrations assists in staying ahead of market trends as well.

Why Monitoring Matters

Many businesses wrongly think their brand is protected after their Trademark registration is complete. This is just the beginning. You, as the owner, are solely responsible for policing and protecting your mark from infringement by others.

If you are not keeping track of your mark, you can face severe consequences, such as:

Loss of Trademark Rights: If you don’t prevent people from using your mark, its use can become rampant. Eventually, it can weaken your right and, at worst, force you to lose your exclusive right to use that trademark.
Brand Value Erosion: A trademark is an important intangible asset. The impact on your brand value and credibility when imitators or “knock-offs” come to market with inferior products is devastating. This can even cause other stakeholders (like suppliers or creditors) to hesitate to do business with you.
Brand Uniqueness Dissipation: Losing the uniqueness of your brand is the worst. It can make the customers that are loyal to you leave. If your competitors start using similar marks, customers will get confused. This could diminish the unique identity that you worked so hard on. This is a direct threat to the value of your original Trademark Registration.
Missing the Trademark Opposition Window: There is also a statutory time period for opposition during which you can oppose a conflicting mark’s application if it is filed by a competitor. You’ll miss this vital window if you’re not monitoring and it will be far more difficult and costlier to try to fight a competitor’s conflicting Trademark Registration later.
Countering the Doctrine of Laches: In a lawsuit, a defendant can claim laches and argue that you waited too long to assert your rights. Active monitoring supports a robust argument against this defense demonstrating that you have been vigilant in protecting your initial Trademark Registration.

Active monitoring is the only method to safeguard your brand equity, protect your reputation and have the necessary evidence to undertake a successful Trademark Opposition.

LAWFINITY’S WATCH SERVICE

Although you can attempt to keep an eye on your mark on your own using services such as Google Alerts, this method is almost always inadequate and cannot offer the full range of protection. The task is massive, spanning global databases, countless websites, and social media platforms.

That’s why it’s so important to have professional help. Our Trademark Watch Service is tailored to be the first line of defense for your brand. Using advanced tools and professional expertise, we safeguard your incredibly valuable Trademark Registration.

Here's what we do for you:

Registry Monitoring: We monitor for new trademarks applied for at national and international registries to establish whether there may be identical or confusingly similar trademarks.
Marketplace & Web Monitoring: We continuously look at online marketplaces, e-commerce sites, and social media for unauthorized usage and knock-offs.
Competitor Tracking: We offer visibility and insight into your competitor's IP activity, helping you anticipate their next moves.

Simply securing your Trademark registration is not the end goal, protecting your trademark is. Our watchdog service is the best way to protect your investment in your Trademark registration.

EARLY OPPOSITION ALERTS

Having a professional monitoring service gives you the best trademark protection because of Early Opposition Alerts. Once a competing trademark application is published in the official Trademarks Journal or Gazette, the clock starts running, and Trademark opposition must be filed within a limited statutory deadline of generally 30 to 60 days. If you do not file an opposition, protecting your trademark will be much more complex and expensive.

With Lawfinity, our watch service helps you keep track of your Trademark registrations. We alert you as soon as a similar mark is published, giving you enough time to assess the threat and trademark opposition. These alerts are crucial to enforce your rights and stop a competitor's damaging Trademark Registration before it is finalized. Our monitoring will be the basis of a timely and successful Trademark Opposition.