Google Adword Brand Use Battle!

In the beginning … was the word – the global brand name! And Google, came into their sacred garden selling Adwords to advertisers who used company brand names as keywords and thus, allegedly infringed trademarks! As online keyword ownership battles take to the European high courts, the spotlight is on the power of the link!

Nothing drives visitor traffic like PPC – paid search via sponsored ads – and SEO keyword link building. Both methods are recognised as essential toolkits in today’s business online marketing environment to build progressive brand identity.

It’s small wonder that the biggest players are now looking seriously at how their brand names have been monetised by Google’s Adwords. The paid search service allows advertisers to pay a fee which enables the ‘sponsored links’ to their own websites to be most likely, the first returned to a visitors keyword search result.

Buying a sponsored link on a global superbrand name keyword, such as Nokia, Nike, Sony, Louis Vuitton or Chanel etc, can be a most lucrative marketing strategy for retailers who stock the actual named brand goods. However, the retailers do not pay the companies concerned for using the brand name.

A further controversial tactic is the buying of specific brand names keywords by their rivals, with the aim of diverting trade and traffic to themselves. Some major names also fear that a loss of control of their brands to the likes of counterfeiters who would damage reputation, confuse or drive away consumers.

Paid ads are the core of online commerce and a mainstay of Google’s business and it derives 97 percent of its annual revenue of nearly $24 billion from advertising. Google used to block advertisers from buying others’ brand names as keywords, but in 2004 it changed its policy in North America and four years later extended that to Britain and Ireland.

Google could win a widely expected victory at The European Court of Justice in Luxembourg. The case is the first at such a high level to test Google’s liability, yet may still face many more battles over keyword advertising.

Experts believe the court will rule at least partly in Google’s favour, based on the previous opinion of the court’s Advocate General that Google did not infringe brand owners’ rights by allowing advertisers to buy keywords corresponding to trademarks.

Google currently faces eight cases alone in the United States over the sale of trademarked keywords. Other leading brand names cases include the UK wing of Interflora, who are suing Marks & Spencer for using the keyword ‘Interflora’ and variants to trigger ads for itself, and a possible litigation concerning Louis Vuitton, if they can demonstrate that sponsored links are being sold to unauthorised individuals, such as counterfeiters or the grey goods market.

EBay, which buys keywords from Google and also operates its own internal search, has similarly been sued by brand owners, including Louis Vuitton, in Europe and the United States over its use of keywords.

Trademark law has clearly not kept pace with the digital age and now the liability of the major service providers on the web, such as Google, are being questioned. Businesses, website design and SEO agencies, would do well to take note of future developments.