Trademark policy

Anyone who's read any of my other blogs or articles will know I'm a little peeved (shall we say) by Google's Trademark policy. Perhaps "a little peeved" is an understatement.. perhaps incensed is a better word.


Here's the scenario, if you own the trademark to a word or phrase you can ask Google to disallow companies from bidding against that term or from using that term in their advertising. So Safeway can't bid on Tesco related keywords. Fair enough I hear you say!!!!


The big players in all kinds of industries are abusing this rule to create a search engine results monopoly and its unfair and plain wrong. In my particular industry of expertise (travel) there are tour operators who have traditionally sold their product through a whole network of independent travel agents. A large number of these operators have trademarked their brands and have made sure that these agents cannot bid on those terms. Some of these operators are totally boldfaced about the practice and openly admit they are simply forcing their customers to book direct rather than use their own agents.



Looking at the adCenter policy document it seems that adCenter are making exceptions where…

"The Advertiser's website sells authentic goods or services that are distributed under the trademark."


adCenter, I applaud you!!! This is a breakthrough for common sense and will help break the search engine monopoly caused by the greed of these bigger companies.