DELL claims trademark on Adwords

big brands are waking up

[Shak]

Word on the street is that DELL has asked Google to stop any bids with the word Dell in them.

This is similar to Ebay in the past
[webmasterworld.com...]

I am still seeing the bids in the UK, so it must be a USA thing to start off with.

anyone affected by this?

Shak

[peewhy]

I saw this coming a while ago. There was a similar case with a big brand in an affiliate program demanding that their name was not to be used in any form of bidding or search engine submission.

From one side of the fence they have to protect their brand and ring fence it from abuse.

The other side begs the question, why recruit affiliates if they cannot use the brand name?

Imagine if all manufacturers jealously guarded their brands to the extent that no one was allowed to use it in any form of bidding or online promotion?

It would cause a few problems for a lot of sites, including some of the big boys.

[dmorison]

Interesting one.

This could become a pain for Google. How is this kind of thing treated in "traditional" media?

Don't individual advertisers take responsibility?

If "PC World" want to advertise in "The Times", surely it is between them and Dell as to whether the word Dell can be used.

I can understand a publisher wishing to exercise editorial rights over the nature / tone of an advert; but as regards trademarks etc. within them I personally think that is a matter between the advertiser and the trademark owner.

[Shak]

peewhy, I see where you are coming from, and maybe that whole issue could be discussed in a seperate thread.

for the moment, I can see a lot of Dell affiliates being upset, so lets see what they make of it...

Shak

[webdiversity]

Google have stopped bids on words like "Adwords", Holiday Inn has censured all keywords with their name in it (but not on OV), obviously there is the "easy" stuff from Stelios and plenty more.

I think that the clock is ticking, the providers are not going to go out of their way to stop it because it must be a decent revenue stream for them, they'll do it if asked to but not with too much vigour to hunt it down. For some it will take a long time to find them because they don't realise the potential of the internet (it'll never catch on).

When they do get it they will cut off significant revenue streams and not find the way to replace it, so I'd be more inclined to be working on approved ad copy and dos and taboos rather than stopping revenue streams cold in their tracks.

[peewhy]

Okay Shak, I fully understand. I've started the topic called 'Brand names banned from bids in Advertising and Affiliate Programs.
[webmasterworld.com...]

[devendra]

In the UK markets advertisers have been very aggressive in dropping affiliates who infringe on their names for a long time. Advertisers type in their brand name in google and backtrack who is advertising. One brand - William Hill - is particularly aggressive in enforcing this and whizzes off letters and legal threats left right and centre. Affiliate networks also discourage name squatting on adwords.

In my experience, the adword editors remove the offending terms without even informing the advertiser. Currently, editing seems to be manual rather than automatic so detection is everything...

[jamie_h]

Hi First post, so be nice ;)

yes can confirm that Dell as a keyword is now banned from adwords.

Was speaking to adwords support yesterday who confirmed it.

If you currently have ads they will be taken down over the next few weeks (when the guys at google get a spare 5 mins)

Personal feeling is that its the big ad agencys who are doing this due to the premium sponsorship being taken down. From what it apears they dont have much of a clue when competing on adwords.

Cheers
Jamie

[Shak]

Jamie,

Welcome to Webmasterworld [webmasterworld.com]

Glad to see you posting, and hope to see many wise words in the future...

Shak

[skibum]

It had to be a killer for some eHarmony affiliates when they banned affiliates from using the brand in PPC.

Lead to sale conversion while I was in there was about 50%. Now ya midas well just go after the SERPs with a site and skip the AdWords. Click to sale conversion was around 4%.

The brand is powerful and valuable but being able to buy the branded terms and making a higher percentage from that would help to give affiliates of Dell or anyone else the incentive and cash to find the best unbranded terms for customer and save the big brand the trouble of having to deal with it all.

Dell is probably big enough it doesn't really matter. They'll end up saving $$$ and have better control over their message presented in the Ad listings.