How Do Trade Marks Protect Consumers?
Emily Young
Your business’ brand is essential to its success. Trade marks are one way that you can help protect your brand, providing you with avenues to prevent others from infringing on your trade marks. In addition, trade marks serve as a valuable marketing tool, helping you distinguish your brand from all other brands, increasing the value of your trade marks and therefore your overall business. As well as the many benefits of trade marks to a business, trade marks are also important to consumers. Trade marks protect consumers in several ways, further adding to why you should consider trade mark registration for your business. To help you better understand the benefits of trade marks to consumers, this article will take you through three ways trade marks protect consumers.
1. Communication Tool
Trade marks are an effective communication tool between brands and consumers. They can help consumers make better choices about their consumption of goods or services. With so many businesses providing different goods and services, any form of communication between consumers and businesses is a valuable tool.
When viewing a trade mark, consumers can identify the brand they are looking at, which can help them make informed decisions about their choices as consumers. Certain types of trade marks in particular, such as a logo a slogan, can also help share messages about your brand with consumers. For example, your slogan may provide information about the type of goods or services you are selling or provide insight into the values of your business. While this helps businesses appeal to certain markets, it also helps consumers make choices about their purchases.
2. Vouch for Reputation
Trade marks help prevent misleading commercial conduct, which in turn protects consumers. Trade mark registration provides the owner of a trade mark the exclusive rights to use and commercialise their trade mark under their specified classes of goods and services. These also give trade mark owners the right to prevent others from using their trade mark. Inherently, this system ensures consumers know exactly what they are purchasing when they buy it.
Your business’ brand and reputation go hand in hand, which extends to consumers’ perception of your brand. For example, say a consumer purchases something from your brand and are satisfied with its quality. They will then associate your brand with high-quality goods or services. This may be the very reason they keep returning to buy your products.
On the other hand, if a competitor business tried to steal your brand using poorer quality goods or services, this would tarnish your reputation. Trade marks and your enforcement of the associated rights are therefore critical to both the reputation of your business and consumers’ right not to be misled or deceived about the origin of products.
3. Anti-Competitive Behaviour
The very nature of intellectual property helps protect consumers. This is largely due to the protection it creates against anti-competitive behaviour, which can help smaller businesses compete against larger businesses in the same market. However, while competition is usually a good thing, in the space of trade marks, it is not. This is because two trade marks that are identical or deceptively similar will cause consumer confusion.
When applying for a trade mark, your trade mark will be assessed to ensure it is not identical to or too similar to a pre-existing trade mark. As well as a trade mark examiner assessing this, other businesses will also be able to dispute your trade mark registration if they have concerns it will infringe on their trade mark.
Key Takeaways
Trade marks are a key component of your business. As well as being important for you as a business owner, they also play an essential role in protecting consumers. Some of the key ways trade marks protect consumers is by:
- providing a means of communication between businesses and consumers;
- affirming your reputation; and
- preventing harmful anti-competitive behaviour.
If you need help obtaining trade mark registration for your business, our experienced intellectual property (IP) lawyers can help. You can contact them on 1300 657 423 or by filling out the form on this page.
Frequently Asked Questions
Trade marks have several benefits for businesses. Largely, trade mark protection is useful because it gives you exclusive rights to your trade mark. This prevents others from using your trade mark without your permission. Trade marks also serve as a valuable marketing tool, helping you distinguish your brand from your competitors.
While the benefits of a trade mark are typically seen from the perspective of the trade mark owner, trade marks are a valuable tool for consumers. Trade marks can help protect consumers by providing a means of communication between businesses and consumers, acting as a vouch system for the reputation of a business and preventing harmful anti-competitive behaviour.