Question about trademark keywords?

[kvegas]

Good morning All,

Have a question it pertains to trademarks, my brother owns a bike shop and is looking to do some SEM marketing w/a local firm in Atlanta, we were told he needs to sign a keyword release form to use the terms related to Honda, Suzuki, etc. I am not as versed in SEM but sounds feasible to me and we were told Google would require the same thing of him if he did his own campaign, my brother is up in arms and states he will be held accountable for any legal fees if any trademark infringement arose.

Is it industry standard to have a keyword release form? thanks in advance.

[AussieWebmaster]

If he is selling those brands yes... it is as if he were an online affiliate

[abbottsys]

Originally Posted by kvegas

Good morning All,

Have a question it pertains to trademarks, my brother owns a bike shop and is looking to do some SEM marketing w/a local firm in Atlanta, we were told he needs to sign a keyword release form to use the terms related to Honda, Suzuki, etc. I am not as versed in SEM but sounds feasible to me and we were told Google would require the same thing of him if he did his own campaign, my brother is up in arms and states he will be held accountable for any legal fees if any trademark infringement arose.

Is it industry standard to have a keyword release form? thanks in advance.

Depend how he wants to use them. You can use them as keywords without violating trademarks, the only problem arises if you want to use them in the text of your ad. For example, I use google often as a keyword, but I cannot use google in my ad text.

[laurenl]

Im not sure about this...

[michelle car]

You can buy whatever keywords you like, but I do know you won't be able to use Honda in your copy because this IS trademarked - I know from expereince.

Type in Honda or variations, Honda Bike, etc and you'll see a lot of dealers will come up, maybe even a few competitors. Hense you can buy what keywords you like. The dealers and aggregators are allowed to use Honda in their copy because they are either selling leads or are affiliated with Honda. But for example, Harley Davidson could not use Honda in their copy, but they could certainly buy the keyword "Honda Bike" if they wished.

I know there have been a few cases in the past of advertisers taking this to court, but they take Google to court not the other advertisers. And likely Google will kick you off the particular keywords in question if they smell a lawsuit from Honda coming.

[abbottsys]

Originally Posted by michelle car

You can buy whatever keywords you like, but I do know you won't be able to use Honda in your copy because this IS trademarked - I know from expereince.....

Yes, exactly. But if you get really frustrated not being able to use Honda in you ad copy try something like HondaBike or BuyHonda (notice, no spaces). I've used this technique often. Example: many is the time I wanted to use Google in my ad copy, so I used things like GoogleSearch or byGoogle. Not a clever solution, but it helps.

[kvegas]

Thanks guys for the clarification