Legal protection is an important aspect of professional naming. After all, brands are a valuable possession – in a communicative and economic sense and as intellectual property. Name development can, therefore, not take place separately from trademark law. Every project we do has a trademark lawyer assigned to it, from our in-house legal partner Matchmark.
Our clients, involved with the decisions about naming and branding issues, are rarely legal professionals. This is why we take time to present clear and transparent advice, with a minimal amount of legal jargon.
At the start of a new project we make an overview of the costs and timings for research and registration in the desired territories. This is all tailored to the plans and goals of the project.
Unlike domain names, trademark law does not only encompass the registered brand name, but also any similar names. In addition, a brand is not allowed to be descriptive or too obvious; generally you can’t get a monopoly on language. Some words or images are used too often to diversify them as a brand.
Before every naming presentation the trademark lawyer involved does a preliminary, indicative screening of the proposed names and any other existing alternatives. The options that make the selected shortlist are researched thoroughly against the relevant registers, for similar registrations and trade names. The name that is eventually chosen will be entered in the relevant trademark registers.
Companies, products and services increasingly have an international scope. As a result, potential brand names need to be researched and entered in more than one register. The ambition to launch a pan European or worldwide brand demands a thorough risk analysis in terms of the brand and trademark law.
domain names
For every new company name, brand or service, it's important to be able to claim the relevant domain name. In all our projects, we check name proposals for all desired domain name extensions before the presentations. We also take care of the registration of the selected names as domain names.
We can also perform research and registration for names that have not been developed by us. By itself, registration of a domain name does not give any rights on a brand or trade name, but by registration of a domain name, one might come into conflict with existing brand registrations. Therefore, trademark research can be essential when registering a domain name.