Ci Sense Blog

Who Wants to be a Fragrance Millionaire?

When it comes to non-conventional trademarks (such as sound, scents, shapes, colors and so forth), it’s interesting and, occasionally, a bit unsettling what companies will try to trademark. While perfume companies understandably want their particular carefully developed fragrances to be trademarkable, certain scents should be left alone.

“The olfactory memory is probably the most reliable memory that humans posses… Consequently, economic operators have a clear interest in using olfactory signs to identify their goods.”

Companies want you to follow your nose… And if the scent is trademarked, they figure your nose will lead you right to their doorstep.

So what kinds of scents do companies look to make theirs? Well, a Lithuanian company wanted to trademark the scent of pizza:

“Opinion polls show that many consumers in Lithuania identify the pleasure of eating pizza with our trade mark,” said Mindaugas Gumauskas, marketing director of the Cilija company. “This makes us believe that the scent of freshly baked pizza is a subject to our copyright.”

OK…

What I’d like to believe is that the smell of fresh fruit, such as strawberries or lemons, is sacred. Well, it is. For now…

Here’s hoping it stays that way.

Also, If you ever want to be a fragrance millionaire from your new cologne which smells like the beach, you’ll probably want to file for protection asap.

Come On, Everyone’s Doing It

When you look at trends in trademark filings, it can be surprising how many Individuals (as oppose to the usual corporate players) file trademarks. Here’s an example of that phenomenon in the beverage industry.

In 2008 Individuals (as opposed company entities) filed over 1900 trademark applications which cover the non-alcoholic beverage industry.

It seems like everyone’s developing their own line of energy drink or enhanced water these days. Perhaps it’s thanks to the number of private labeling, bottle manufacturing and custom flavor companies? Whatever the case, all you need these days is a good name and some money to spare and you’re well on your way to making a name for yourself in this hyper-caffeinated world.

Top Five Ways Trademark Filings Can Boost Competitive Intelligence

Top Five Ways Trademark Filings Can Boost Competitive Intelligence

When we hear the word ‘trademark’, we often think of catchy jingles and lawsuits. But, trademark filing data can be a marketer’s friend. It can offer big clues about what your competition is up to and can illustrate new marketing trends. As a marketer, keeping an eye on the competition and tracking trademark filing activities in your industry can be an effective way to make sure you’re in the loop. Here are five reasons to incorporate monitoring trademark filings into your overall marketing strategy.

1. Trademark filings usually predate product launches or web mentions—sometimes by months, even years. In most cases the first action item after a company decides on a new brand or campaign is to file a trademark. Getting a “heads-up” on competitors’ trademarks gives you time to consider your next move. Since trademark filings are accompanied by a Goods & Services description, you can pick-up small hints as to what the new product might be—is it a spin-off of a preexisting product or something new and different that your company hasn’t considered?
2. Trademarks offer a great way to gauge new trends. By tracking trademark filings over a period of time, you can follow new industry buzzwords or pick-up on product variations that seem to be gaining in popularity. Trend watching with trademarks piggy-backs onto all the market research your competitors have already done!
3. Trademark filings can tip you off to new players in your industry. Aside from monitoring trademark filings to see what your existing competitors are up to, a search by industry can reveal new companies entering the market that you should be on the lookout for.
4. Measure Activity. As a marketer, you’re responsible for market research and keeping an eye on the competitive landscape. That can be tricky. Monitoring competitor’s filings and comparing them with historical filing servers as a good metric of you competitor’s overall financial and creative health. How many trademarks do they usually file within a given year? How does this year compare with previous years? Of course, filing a trademark is not a huge investment, and some companies have filed trademarks and then gone out of business shortly afterwards. But, more often than not, seeing a new filing indicates of a sign of life.
5. Monitoring trademark filings easily integrates into existing Competitive Intelligence activities. Ad-hoc methods of keep track of your competitors’ latest products (clippings, bookmarks, RSS feeds, etc.) is involved, time consuming and reactive when it should be proactive. Trademark filing dates, along with categorization and owner information, are designed to be archived and so are easy to attain, read and interpret. Whether you need to get the “big picture” or are searching for targeted information, mining trademark filings for competitive intelligence should be part of your marketing strategy.

CI – Just for Big Businesses? Think Again.

Think competitive intelligence is mostly relevant for bigger companies? Trademark searching for competitive intelligence may be even more vital if you’re a small or medium-sized business.

Often, in this blog, in order to provide recognizable examples, we refer to well know-brands and companies. Chances are, however, that you and your competitor are not P&G, Apple or Pepsi (there’s a reason it’s called Fortune 500 not 300,000).

Vernon Prior astutely remarks:

“If, for instance, a large multinational corporation fails to read the market correctly it can often buy its way out of the problem. A small business making a similar mistake will probably fail completely. In some ways, then, involvement in competitive intelligence is much more important for a small business than it is for a large one.”

Further, a smaller business has its own niche markets and needs to be to keep abreast of new developments. Sharing the same niche market with only a few competitors means an even greater need to look over your shoulder.

“Obviously, if you have an SME [small and medium enterprise] and wish to compete effectively, you should aim to offer something different. …you need to find out what is going on, decide what to do about it and take action before your competitors. That, very simply, is competitive intelligence (CI).”

Smaller businesses are faced with too many elements to keep track of, and up until very recently, developing an efficient competitive intelligence strategy was a daunting endeavor. Watching your competitor involved monitoring every possible source to figure out what your competition was doing, planning and so forth. This was not only time-consuming – but also beyond the scope of many smaller businesses. How many truly have the time or resources necessary to dig “into every corner and crevice available” in order to fully understand where they stand and what to do next ?

Missing something pivotal, as Vernon Prior mentioned, can be the kiss of death. You need to know about developments, as they happen. By the time the news of your competitors new product or direction hits the stands (or the net), your competitive advantage is generally lost.

Overall, of course, there is less information readily available for small companies – but this could work in your favour: having fewer competitors with smaller trademark portfolios means that a given filing by any of one of them speaks volumes about future plans.

Filings for marks in categories different from existing products may reveal that they are trying to offer a new feature to an existing product or have identified a growing demand – or even a new market to tap into.

Of course, trying to discern this by traditional trademark watching, only gives you a part of the picture. CI Sense presents information in context within your industry so that you can use it to watch trends and focus on brand competition. Our mission is to bridge the gap between trademarks and competitive intelligence.

We don’t just hand over raw trademark data. We ask the hard questions: what do you really want to know; is there a new competitor in your market; what are emerging trends in your industry? We combine automated indexing and categorization systems with human intelligence and expertise to provide the context that adds insight to trademark descriptions.

And you can compete as though you’re a big fish – even if you happen to be a size smaller.

Attention Trade Show Exhibitors: Do your Homework!

You’re going to a trade show as an exhibitor. What should you do to prepare?

Well before the show, you should be able to access a list other exhibitors (or at the very least, the ones from last year).After a quick scan, compile a list of your competitors or other companies whose profile’s pique you curiosity.

Compile a list by owner of recent filings or add them to you watch list if you haven’t already. Looking at new trademark filings can give you insight into any new products you’re likely to see. They’ll probably be focusing on these new offerings at the show. For the most part, before companies spend money on ad material they’ve probably filed for one more more trademarks. Take the list with you to the show.

From experience, there’s a lot of down time (when potential buyers are off to various sessions, general meetings and so forth) use this time to walk around and see how (and if) some of those new trademarks, brands and so forth are being used.

Doing your homework can also help you decide what you may want to mention or focus on . With enough time you may even throw together a “me too!” component to what you’re selling!

Does Your Competitor Still Have a Pulse?

Is your competitor still ticking?

While glancing through recently filed trademarks, sometimes you’ll come across a trademark filing from your competitor who seems to have been dormant for awhile. Just seeing this indicates that they’re still alive and kicking (and have something in the works).

Of course, filing a trademark is not exactly a huge investment, and certainly some companies have filed a trademark and gone under shortly afterwards – but for the most part seeing a new filing indicates of a sign of life.

A sign you’d be wise to pick up on.

Summary of Filings – Selected Bev Ind.

This shows different companies by year and the category breakdown etc…… Just an example – actual data posted later

21 Bizarre Presidential Brands and Trademarks

Here at CI Sense, we like to keep an eye on how news stories impact the world of brands and trademarks. We recently used our Trademark Explorer to search for some new trademark filings associated with the American presidential candidates.

We hit quite a rich vein of bizarre filings. These are all legitimate applications to the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Here are a few highlights, divided into actual products and odd slogans:

Weird Products

1. Mo’Bama- Apparently to be used for a ‘natural cosmetic skin care powder’. Is that anything like Mo’butter?
2. Barak? Oh Bummer! – To be used on bumper stickers and t-shirts. Clearly spelling is not their strong suit.
3. Bearack Obama – Allegedly to become a future teddy bear. We googled for some samples, but only found this eager ursine Democrat and this creepy blog.
4. Broccoli Obama – We wish we were kidding about this vegetable dish.
5. Obama Llama – Yep, that’d be a stuffed toy. And, of course, the unrelated theme song.
6. Obamanator – An ale from Denver’s Wynkoop Brewing Company. It’s already on the menu, apparently. Halfway through this campaign coverage you can hear about how they might have overdone the hop taste.
7. The Sock Obama – A plush toy. Use your imagination.
8. Palin Pink – Apparently going to be a lip gloss.
9. Palin Not Stalin – To go on shirts and hats. Maybe they filed this one before they knew how Governor Palin’s name was pronounced?
10. Hillary Magic - An air freshener spray, of all things.
11. 69 Reasons Why I Miss Bill Clinton – A ’series of books’. One reason per book, maybe?
12. Anyone But Hillary, 2008 – As you can imagine, there were a lot of variations on this for the bumper sticker and t-shirt crowd.
13. The Clinton Countdown Watch – This one harkens back all the way to 1994, but we wanted to include it because of the amusing description: “watches with a cartoon of President Clinton on the face which count down the number of days he has remaining in office”.

Bad Slogans

1. No Drama With Obama – That one ties for ‘most awful’ with ‘Obama is the Balm…Let’s Heal America’.
2. McCain for Capitalism, Obama for Socialism – To be used in electric and LED signs.
3. O.B.A.M.A. – Depending on which filing you like, this stands for “One Bonafide Achiever Making Change”, “Officially Bridging America Motivating Americans”" or “Our Best Chance for Managing America”.
4. Obama Ain’t Your Momma – More bumper stickers here. It’s unclear which side you’d be supporting if you put this on your Subaru.
5. Obama Bin Biden – Presumably this will be embossed on the back of Republican kaftans.
6. What the Hill-ary Thinking, Don’t Drop a Ticking O-Bama on U.S. Soil – I wish we were kidding about that one.
7. White Haired Dudes for McCain – There are other dudes who support McCain?
8. McCainianc! – That’s a bit creepy, don’t you think?

You can see the reports we generated for all the candidates over on Scribd. To learn more about how we did this research, check out CI Sense.

Trademark Filings & Brand Launches

At CI Sense, we often stress how trademark filings can give you insight into your competitor’s future plans and strategies. There is so much to be gleamed from what your competitor is filing.

For instance, here is an example of a timeline which shows how three trademark filings for a company predated any web mention or official launch.

In this case we also had the luxury of knowing ahead of time about a new slogan and Domain name (microsite) which made it clear what the company was going to push in their next marketing effort.

Had this been your competitor, having this information would have been far, far more beneficial than merely finding out about the new product launch. (Which would have meant, sadly: Game Over.)

Armed with the information above, you would be advised that something big was in the works, you’d have an idea of what that was and you’d be able to plan ahead, react, take action – and compete.