If you are an entrepreneur looking to protect your brand through IP protections, you may ask: should I trademark my logo? If your logo is an incredibly important asset to your brand (which it would be for most), then the answer is yes. Besides your brand name, it is what customers will use to recognize you. When you think of many famous brands such as Apple and Disney, you usually visualize their logo in your head. Protecting your logo from use by others is important in your strategy for protecting your brand.
Should I Trademark My Logo?
There are many reasons why you should trademark your logo. Since your logo is used for commercial purposes, a trademark is the way to go. A trademark will solidify you as the legal owner of your logo. It will also allow you to take legal action against others who use it without your permission. Simply put, the trademark is one of the key pieces that make up your brand, and you should do everything in your power to protect it against use from others.
When you create and use your logo for commercial purposes, you already have some legal protection over it. Applying for and receiving a trademark solidifies this, and makes it known that you are the owner and the party allowed to use the trademarked symbol. The late fashion powerhouse Virgil Abloh built his Off-White streetwear empire on a complex series of trademark filings.
How Do You Trademark a Logo?
The first thing you should do before getting a trademark is search for existing trademarks that may be similar to yours. You can do this using USPTO’s Trademark Electronic Search System. After ensuring that your symbol is not already trademarked, you can begin the application process. This will consist of preparing a trademark application that will include details such as personal information and information on the products or services the trademarked logo will represent.
Once the application is submitted, you can track the progress of the application. If everything looks good, the USPTO will approve your application and will publish your new trademark in a journal to make it official.
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Seriously lame. Apparently written for people who know NOTHING and probably should not be in business or being responsible for IP. You should have explained that a business should trademark their name. Secondly, trademark the logo. One does not protect the other. Trademarking your logo only does not protect your name, even if the name is included in the logo. Also, do not attempt to save money by trademarking your name and your tag line together. Trademark them separately. One could write an entire article about searching trademarks as well. Not as easy as you might think.
Hi Dan, thanks for your feedback! This series is for basic fundamental q’s we get asked about IP. We do in fact have quite a few blogs on trademark search and trademark basics. Check it out below:
https://michelsonip.com/a-step-by-step-guide-to-trademark-searching-part-1/
https://michelsonip.com/basics-of-ip-blog-series-5-establishing-your-trademark-protection/
As a growing brand, it’s in your best interest to be proactive about trademarking your unique brand assets. But before you can file for a trademark, you need to have a unique logo to trademark! So it is very necessary while starting a business that you find a name that is not yet registered and register it. To find out if a name is registered you can take the help of trademarking lawyers.