U.S. Trademarks

Essentially you want a strong trademark (or trademarks) so others cannot use/copy your brand(s) or a confusingly similar variation and benefit from all your hard work and name recognition that you’ve put into building your brand(s).

Consider the following three (3) scenarios which show why you want to establish your trademark rights.

Scenario 1: You’ve been operating for some time now under your brand (which might be your channel name and/or various social media handles) and you are made aware that someone else is using a confusingly similar brand, either on purpose to intentionally try to benefit from your recognition (or even just by accident). Maybe one of your followers/subscribers makes you aware of this other person. In any event, you want this other person to stop using the confusingly similar brand so as to avoid confusion and to not dilute your brand recognition.

If you have taken the proper steps so that your brand is a strong trademark and you were first to use your brand as your trademark, then you should be in the lawful position to insist that this other person stops using the confusingly similar brand. And if that other person refuses to stop, you may be in a position to sue that person for trademark infringement.

Whereas, if had not taken the proper steps to make sure your brand is a strong trademark, you may not be in a position to protect your brand.

Scenario 2: You’ve been operating for some time now under your brand (which might be your channel name and/or various social media handles) and now some other third party alleges that your brand infringes the third party’s trademark rights.

If you’ve taken the proper steps to establish your brand as your trademark (such as clearing the rights to use your brand as your trademark and U.S. federally registering your brand as your trademark) you might be in a better position to avoid trademark infringement allegations altogether. Or you may be in a better position to defend against the trademark infringement allegation.

Scenario 3: A some point in the future you want to sell your business. If you have a strong trademark that you’ve taken steps to establish, then much of the value of your business, such as, your reputation/goodwill will be attached to your trademark. But if your trademark is weak or nonexistent, then you may find it harder to sell your reputation/goodwill associated with your business.

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In short, if you are ever need to assert your trademark rights, then you will have wanted to establish your trademark rights first, so that you can then be in a position to enforce your trademark rights when the need arises.

Very often with YouTubers, Influencers, and/or the like, its is your channel names and/or social media handles that are your brand and that may function as a trademark.

Ideally before you adopt some name, words, and/or phrase as your brand (e.g., channel names and/or social media handles) you want to make sure that the contemplated name, words, and/or phrase will not cause you any future problems. This means doing some due diligence before adopting some channel name and/or social media handles as your brand. This means avoiding names, words, and/or phrases that are confusingly similar with preexisting trademarks; avoiding names, words, and/or phrases that entirely describe your services and/or products; avoiding any names/images that similar to any famous brands.

Generally, this entails making sure that the contemplated name, words, and/or phrase is NOT confusingly similar to any preexisting brands/trademarks that are famous; and/or that are associated with similar products and/or services as you plan to offer in association with your brand.

As a YouTuber, Influencer, and/or the like, your services will likely at least be some form of entertainment and/or education depending upon your content. And depending upon your merch (merchandise) your brand may also be associated with certain products (e.g., clothing is super common for merch).

So, you likely want to pick channel names and/or social media handles that are dissimilar to any famous trademarks, dissimilar to any other entertainers, YouTubers, Influencers, and clothing companies.

It may NOT be sufficient to pick a channel name and/or a social media handle that is merely available on the given platform. Because if you adopt and use a channel name and/or a social media handle that is confusingly similar to a preexisting trademark, that conduct of yours may expose you being liable for trademark infringement.

Secondly, when trying to determine your channel names and/or social media handles, try to pick names, words, and/or phrases that do NOT entirely describe your services and/or products. Because descriptive trademarks are weak.

For example, consider a trademark of APPLE. APPLE does not describe associated consumer electronics products, so with respect to consumer electronics the trademark of APPLE is non-descriptive and that is desirable under U.S. trademark law. Whereas, if you were an apple farmer and wanted to sell your apples under a trademark of APPLE, well know your trademark describes your products and that is bad as far as U.S. trademark law goes because other apples farmers fairly must use the word “apple” to describe the products they are selling. So, in that example, APPLE would be descriptive for products of apples; and in that example then the trademark of APPLE would be weak and not desirable (because you cannot prevent others from using apple to describe apples). So, try to pick your channel names and/or social media handles, so they are NOT entirely descriptive your services and/or products. (A portion of your overall brand/makr may be descriptive, but preferably most of your brand/mark will not be descriptive.)

Lastly, whenever possible, try to pick name(s), word(s), and/or phrase(s) that can be consistent across the different social media platforms that you use or plan to use. This is not a legal requirement; however, if you can do this, to the extent possible, this practice may lower the costs for you (because you may have fewer brands/marks to register) and may make implementing/using the brands/marks easier as there be fewer brands/marks to use and keep track of. Also, the fewer brands/marks to use and the more consistent you can be in your use, the easier it generally is to build brand recognition (brand equity).

Now that you’ve picked an appropriate name(s), word(s), phrase(s), and/or logo/design for your brand (e.g., for your channel name(s) and/or social media handle(s)), how do you turn that picked brand into a trademark?

Essentially you want to do two things: (1) you want to use your brand(s) consistently in your content and/or in relation to selling/offering your services and/or products; and (2) you want to seek to register your brand(s) as a U.S. federally registered trademark (i.e., registration with the USPTO (Trademark Office).

For example, with respect to use, display your brand(s)/trademark(s) in your videos, photos, posts, websites, written content, etc. Your brand(s)/trademark(s) can appear in intros, outros, video descriptions, as watermarks, in headers, in footers, etc.

For clothing merch, your trademark must appear on a tag and/or a label attached to the given article of clothing OR be marked on the product packaging exterior.

I generally charge my attorney fee of $300 to $600 to prepare and file a given U.S. federal trademark registration application, that will be filed at/with the USPTO (U.S. Trademark Office).

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And the USPTO currently charges a government fee of $250 per class OR $350 per class for a newly filed U.S. federal trademark registration application. For example, YouTubers typically provide a service of entertainment/education which is Class 041; whereas, clothing merchandise is Class 025.

Note, the USPTO (government) fees can change from time to time.

Note, there can be a variety of other costs associated with a filed/pending trademark registration application and/or with having a registered trademark. I can go over such other possible costs with you.

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Also note, if you can refer another client to me who needs trademark work, I can reduce my typical attorney fee of $300 to $600 to $150 to $300 instead, if the referral does hire me for trademark work.