Trademarks are the life of the business. Every business needs to have a trademark so that people can easily recognize them. Trademarks show intellectual and emotional attributes and can convey messages about you, your company, your company’s reputation, and your products and services.

Trademarks do not need any word to be identified, a design or an alphabet is enough for the brand to be recognized worldwide. For example Nike, Nike has a tick type design, and this design is known to every human being in the world. Before further proceeding, we need to understand the term trademark. What does the trademark mean?

What is a Trademark?

A Trademark is a type of intellectual property consisting of a design, a word, expression, or a logo that represents a business and its products. It is a legal form to register your company name so that no other organizations can use or copy your name as long as it remains in use and proper paperwork and fees are paid.

Trademark is a form to recognize your brand worldwide. You do not even need to see the name of the organization, the trademark is more popular than the company name. Let's take an example of an apple sign which is half bite taken out, the brand of apple is very popular across the world because of the trademark. People easily recognize his brand by seeing his sign.

Why is Trademark important?

The main purpose of registering a trademark is to stop competitors of your business from stealing your business name, logo, design, or slogan. Protecting your unique name, word, symbol or logo is one of the most important investments in your business. In many cases, businesses lose their logos, unique selling positions, and slogans due to the lack of registering a trademark.

By registering your trademark, you're protecting your rights as a business owner so no other competitor can diminish or dilute your quality of products or services. Not only the same business name or logo but also anything confusingly similar to your business name, a trademark can stop all of them.

To Get Trade Registration Visit: https://www.tradeinnovation.in/trade_mark-8273/

There are so many benefits of using trademarks for the growth of the business and to be recognized across the world.

● Gives a mark of identification: Trademark gives you a permanent design or name for your business that can be used to identify your business across the world. People can easily recognize you by seeing your trademark. The marketplace is now crowded and it’s hard to distinguish between your business and your competitors. Trademarks/brands are an efficient communication tool to attract customer attention and make your business, products, and services stand out.

● Reach vast audiences: With the help of a trademark, every single person would recognize you and your brand. Your brand is the very first thing customers enter into a search engine or social media platform (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram) when searching for your products and services. The Internet and social media together work to gain more audience into the business.

● A better option for business expansion: It can work for increasing value to startup business matures, more so, if the startup continues to expand. Thus, it's important to use a trademark for marketing strategies to help the enhancement of brand recognition and to attract more consumers. If your company thinks to expand into other countries too, you can use your federal registration for foreign trademark filing.

How do you get a Trademark?

You can trademark any of the following or even a combination of things like Word, Phrase, Logo, Graphic, Smell, Letter, or a Combination of Colors. If a person company want to register in trademark, then you need to follow steps which are:

1. Search for a perfect brand name.
Firstly the most important part is to search for the perfect brand name which could be whacky and quirky because all the generic ones are any which way taken.

2. Fill the trademark application.
Now your name is finalized, fill the trademark application for further proceedings. The application form name is TM1 and the cost will be ₹3500 which is a one-time fee. You have to need some things along with the application:
● Taking the concern of business registration: Depending on your business you need to submit an identity proof of the directors of the company and an address proof.
● An image of the brand whether it could be logo or design but it has to be in a standard size of 9 x 5 cms.

3. Fill the brand name registration application.
After the trademark application, you have to fill the brand name registration application. There are two ways to fill the form.
● Manual Filling: In this, you need to go to the office and fill directly into the offices of the Registrar of TradeMarks located in Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, and Ahmedabad.
● e- filing: In this, the application is issued immediately.

You will now receive the acknowledgment, you can use the symbol of your brand name.

4. Examining the application.
Examining means the checking, the Registrar checks whether the brand name complies with the law and does not dispute with other existing registered or pending brands. That's why the brand name should be antique and different.

5. Publication in the Indian Trade Journals.
After all that process, the brand name is published in the Indian Trade Journals. They will check for 90 days or maybe 120 days in most of the cases from the date of publication, if no one raises opposition, the brand name proceeds to be certified.

6. Get the Certificate of Registration.
This is the last step, when no one raises any opposition regarding brand name or logo, the Registrar accepts the trademark application. Now you can use the registered trademark symbol next to your brand name, once the certificate has been issued.

The process of getting a trademark is quite long. It will take 15-18 months in the process. The period of using a trademark is 10 years, after that, you will have to be renewed.

Using a trademark is a choice but all businessmen don’t need to have a trademark in their brand name. Investing in a trademark may not be essential. What matters most is to create valuable products for the customer's choices and demands.