Your Business Name

Have you ever had a lawyer check the status of your intellectual property?

Start with your brand name. I had a client who operated under a very well known name and logo in his local area. He had never bothered to register or trade mark the logo they used. I sent him to a trusted legal contact of mine and it ended up costing him $15,000 to ensure that his intellectual property was protected. If he had of done this from the start it woul have cost a fraction of that.

Did you know that in Australia your business name is only valid in the State that it is registered in.

This is even more important when you come to sell the business. I was interested in buying into a business about four years ago and found that they did not have their domain name registered. I then went out and registered it in my name and that stopped them ever being able to get the domain name of their business and, in my opinion lessened the value as they could not sell online with their own brand name.

When I did not go ahead and get involved I actually gave them back their own domain name for the cost of what I had spent. ( about $69 ) They were in shock when I told them.

Get some external advice on your brand status.

Bill Winter