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It is a common trend among some affiliate marketers can try to earn commissions by targeting trademark brand names. While there are some proper, legal ways to do this, many marketers do not have the right knowledge or simply do not care to take the time to ensure that they are not violating trademark infringement or copyright laws.
However, ignorance to these laws will not stop companies from filing lawsuits or affiliate programs from seizing commissions. Some simple tips and rules to follow have been provided here that can help both beginner and expert affiliate marketers avoid problems that can result in a lot of lost time and effort, as well as potential legal costs.
Brand Name Domains
One of the most common mistakes made by affiliate marketers is registering domain names that contain brand names or other trademarked names. Unfortunately, domain name registrars don't give customers adequate warnings about these types of registrations, much less prevent them, so it is important that marketers are vigilant to ensure they are not registering one of these domains.
The consequences of registering a brand name domain can vary, even beyond the scope of lawsuits, but none of them are good news for the person that bought the domain. The legal owner of a trademarked name can easily have website hosting suspended to bring the site down, and they can also seize actual ownership of the domain and website without having to pay the site owner anything.
Affiliate programs are also aware of these issues and can get in trouble if they do not enforce them. As a result, commissions can be seized from account balances and even from past paid funds. In addition to this major problem that nobody wants to experience, affiliates are often permanently banned from the network after these violations.
Trademark Impersonation
Another major violation of trademark laws is any sort of attempt to deceive or even imply that the affiliate is associated with the legal owner of the trademark. Specific language should be provided on every page of a website that references a trademarked name to ensure that this distinction is clear to the visitors of the site.
Logos are another important aspect of trademark impersonation and infringement that is often violated by affiliates. Unless a company specifically states or provides written permission that their logo or likeness can be used, affiliates should completely avoid using those logos in any manner.
The best way to avoid these problems is to simply use plain text to state the company or brand name. Special HTML characters can also be used to mark it with the “TM” symbol, while a disclaimer on the page states who is the legal owner of the trademark.
Targeting Brands on Search Engines
In general, brand names should not be targeted with pay-per-click advertising on search engines. This is often referred to as “keyword bidding”, so brand name or trademarked keywords should never be targeted in these search marketing campaigns.
There is a proper way to target brand-name keyword traffic on search engines. Single pages on a site can have a page title or page content that includes the trademarked brand name using the recommended trademark marking and a disclaimer. If these pages are properly optimized for those brand-name keyword phrases, organic search engine rankings can be obtained for those phrases.
Untapped Niche Markets
When used incorrectly, playing with trademarks and brand names can get affiliate marketers into serious trouble, but when used properly, they can provide a major source of income. In general, many of these niche markets centered around brand names actually have extremely low competition.
There are two main reasons why brand name competition is typically low. The first is that a lot of marketers don't know the proper rules to compete in these markets, or they are too intimidated of the potential consequences to try. The second is that quite a few marketers try and do not do it properly, so they are shut down frequently.
By avoiding the common mistakes of trademark infringement and following some simple tips, affiliate marketers can tap into an entire world of niche markets with a lot of potential. One of the best and easiest ways to succeed in these markets is to build review sites for a general type of product with individual pages to target brands for that product type. A wealth of information on affiliate marketing and affiliate website building as well as information on book affiliate programs.
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