Passing off Law re google adwords

[katej]

Recently a competitor has been using my company name which I have trademarked as one of their google adwords. I mentioned this to someone and they told me they often do this to competitors and it was common in business circles. Yet someone else said this was called 'passing off' and that marks & spencers employs someone full time to ensure companies do not use their name on google to attract website visitors.

Any advice from the legal people please would be appreciated.

[SteveGibson]

Recently a competitor has been using my company name which I have trademarked as one of their google adwords. I mentioned this to someone and they told me they often do this to competitors and it was common in business circles. Yet someone else said this was called 'passing off' and that marks & spencers employs someone full time to ensure companies do not use their name on google to attract website visitors.

Any advice from the legal people please would be appreciated.

I'm not a lawyer, but I'll give you my understanding as a PPC consultant.

If you believe that no-one should be allowed to bid on your company name on adwords, talk to google. But expect them to say "no" to you.

If you set your sights lower and say that no-one should be allowed to use your name in the text of their ads, then google would be more willing to listen to you.

However, they may still say "no".

So, ultimately, the answer is "talk to google and see what they're willing to do for you".

Steve

[ken_uk]

have a read here http://www.google.com/tm_complaint_adwords.html

[katej]

Thanks guys for your advice. According to the article Google will investigate this further because the name is trademarked, if it had not been trademarked I would have to take the issue up myself. Someone has also emailed me saying it had happened to them and google do take any trademark infringement seriously, although it does take quite a while for the procedure to go through

[Claire B]

Interesting post as this is currently happening to us. Have reported it now though so thank you for the link :)

Actually, I am surprised because a number of our competitors seem to do it to each other on a fairly regular basis!

[Words of Magic]

Recently a competitor has been using my company name which I have trademarked as one of their google adwords. I mentioned this to someone and they told me they often do this to competitors and it was common in business circles. Yet someone else said this was called 'passing off' and that marks & spencers employs someone full time to ensure companies do not use their name on google to attract website visitors.

Any advice from the legal people please would be appreciated.

Get in contact with google as soon as possible. Make it clear to them that a competitor is using your trademark in a google adwords campaign. Google should take immediate action and resolove your issue asap. Good luck.

Wishing you all the success in the world,

[katej]

Thanks Paul, I have filled in the complaints form so will wait to hear from google now. Its interesting to see that is happening to other businesses too, which is a shame as I'm all for healthy competition but using someone elses name to trigger your ad seems to be quite unethical in my view.

[SolsburyHill]

Maybe of interest on Adwords and the case in particular:-

http://www.out-law.com/page-6775

http://www.out-law.com/page-6776

the basics of trade mark law:-

http://www.out-law.com/page-339

[redyork]

I'm not an expert in this field but I'd promptly write to the company that is using your tradmarked name and clearly point out that the name is registered to you and if they do not remove the name within all advertisments and any other company marketing material with immediate effect you will pass the matter to your legal representation. Ask them to confirm once they have removed it too. Adwords is simply the forum that they are using, Google cannot be expected to police this or be the mediator, contact the company directly. good luck, how annoying !!

[Crossguard]

Get trade mark registration for your name and you'll always be likely to have a better case.