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Brand/Product name in domain

by xhawkx
17 replies
Hi,

Lately I've been reading a lot on this topic of Internet Marketing. This forum has certainly helped a lot. I've gathered quite a bit of knowledge and I think I'm in a position now to try my own luck. I'll be starting as an affiliate marketer and looking to target Amazon.

My question is, I've done some research on many keywords that my mind came up with, some existing products, and some soon to be released. But the good amount of searches only involve the brand or product names in them.. I only use Google keyword tool as I can't afford Market Samurai yet..

So the question, how to target that niche, which has good amount of searches for brand or product names and come up with a domain name having those keywords in them? The general keywords usually have A LOT of competition... So I'm afraid I won't be able to rank well in Google..

E.g, orderkeyword.com , keywordreviews.com , etc

Will Amazon allow this if the keyword contains brand or product name?


Any help appreciated.
#brand or product #domain
  • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
    Banned
    Originally Posted by xhawkx View Post

    Will Amazon allow this if the keyword contains brand or product name?
    It's not really about whether Amazon will allow it.

    It's about whether your domain-name contains someone else's trademark.

    Don't assume that the trademark owner will "turn a blind eye to that" just because you're helping them to make some sales. That's not what it's about. Owning a trademark confers obligations on people, as well as rights, because if they apply to renew their trademark and it can be shown that they've failed to take action over breaches of their trademark, that can be held against them and they may not be able to renew it.

    There are many threads here (including some with posts by lawyers, identifiable from their signature-files) discussing many aspects of the "trademarks in domain-names" issue. Try the search function and have a look around. And then forget any plans that involve registering a domain-name which contains someone else's tradmark if you're planning to use it for profit.

    Here's a thread from earlier today, to start your collection.

    And here's a related one from a few days ago.
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    • Profile picture of the author John Racine
      Originally Posted by Alexa Smith View Post

      It's not really about whether Amazon will allow it.

      It's about whether your domain-name contains someone else's trademark.

      Don't assume that the trademark owner will "turn a blind eye to that" just because you're helping them to make some sales. That's not what it's about. Owning a trademark confers obligations on people, as well as rights, because if they apply to renew their trademark and it can be shown that they've failed to take action over breaches of their trademark, that can be held against them and they may not be able to renew it.

      There are many threads here (including some with posts by lawyers, identifiable from their signature-files) discussing many aspects of the "trademarks in domain-names" issue. Try the search function and have a look around. And then forget any plans that involve registering a domain-name which contains someone else's tradmark if you're planning to use it for profit.
      I learned that lesson early in my IM career. I had 2 domains which ended up being trademarked and had to transfer them to the rightful owner. I was very fortunate to not have had it be any more serious than that and get out with only losing the domain name.

      John
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  • Profile picture of the author robchapman
    Yes, be careful not to use a trademarked phrase in your domain name.
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  • Profile picture of the author dave_hermansen
    Yep, good advice regarding TM'd words in your domain name. You don't want to do tons of work getting it ranked and such and then have the corporation force a shut down on you!

    Originally Posted by xhawkx View Post

    My question is, I've done some research on many keywords that my mind came up with, some existing products, and some soon to be released. But the good amount of searches only involve the brand or product names in them.. I only use Google keyword tool as I can't afford Market Samurai yet..
    I recommend checking out my keyword tool at: http://storecoach.com/keyword-tool/search

    It does the following:
    1. Gives you a list of keyword phrases similar to the word you enter.
    2. Tells you how many exact match searches each phrase gets in the US market daily.
    3. Tells you how easily you could rank for each of the keyword phrases listed. It creates a MOS (market opportunity score) from 0-99. The closer the score is to 99, the easier it would be to get to page 1 of google for that phrase.
    It's made for ecommerce people, but would really work for anyone trying to come up with keyword phrases that they can get ranked for.
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  • Profile picture of the author xhawkx
    Thanks everyone, some replies and past threads here.

    So in strictly legal terms it is not allowed to include a trademark in your domain. However from the replies and actual live sites, it seems people still use them and get away with it, as many companies don't bother taking action. But they CAN take it down anytime if they want to.

    Here are two more questions:

    • If we go for generic keyword and does not include product name, how difficult it would be to gain a good position in Google via SEO? Competition for general keywords is always high as per Google keyword tool.

    • Will this legality issue still be of great concern if the owner of that domain is not based in U.S/UK/Canada?
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    • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
      Banned
      Originally Posted by xhawkx View Post

      However from the replies and actual live sites, it seems people still use them and get away with it, as many companies don't bother taking action. But they CAN take it down anytime if they want to.
      Seems a fair summary. They can sue you anytime they like, too, though.

      At the moment there are a lot of people with domains with "Atari" in the name, which they've had for many years, who "aren't very happy" (shall we say?) about their decisions to register them.

      Life's too short for such worries. There are plenty of ways of making a living online without breaching others' rights.

      Originally Posted by xhawkx View Post

      If we go for generic keyword and does not include product name, how difficult it would be to gain a good position in Google via SEO? Competition for general keywords is always high as per Google keyword tool.
      Are you suggesting that using someone else's trademark in a domain-name would make competition easier? It's not a premise I share ...

      Originally Posted by xhawkx View Post

      Will this legality issue still be of great concern if the owner of that domain is not based in U.S/UK/Canada?
      A lot of people who've been sued by Sony think so. (I suppose it could be argued that Sony is based in many countries as it has staffed offices and lawyers in many countries?). I don't know, anyway. Maybe one of the forum's lawyer-members will reply to this, though I think it's pretty safe to guess that you're not going to like the answer if one does. :p

      I wish you good luck, whatever you decide, even though I can't see the attraction of breaching others' rights, myself.
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    • Profile picture of the author Domainate
      Originally Posted by xhawkx View Post

      So in strictly legal terms it is not allowed to include a trademark in your domain. However from the replies and actual live sites, it seems people still use them and get away with it, as many companies don't bother taking action. But they CAN take it down anytime if they want to.
      They can do more than simply take it down. Facebook for instance is suing owners of various Facebook typos for $100,000 per domain, which is in fact a penalty the law covers under the Lanham Act.

      It's never worth using trademarked terms in your domain.
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      • Profile picture of the author fluffythewondercat
        "It's never worth using trademarked terms in your domain without permission."

        There. Fixed it for ya.

        I've suggested on a number of occasions that people actually start a conversation with the trademark holder but it seems no one wants to do that.

        fLufF
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    • Profile picture of the author dave_hermansen
      Originally Posted by xhawkx View Post

      • If we go for generic keyword and does not include product name, how difficult it would be to gain a good position in Google via SEO? Competition for general keywords is always high as per Google keyword tool.
      It's very possible still. In fact, you can put the brand name in a 'directory' or 'page name' and still have it in your URL. But even if you don't, it's still possible to rank for 'brand name' + 'generic keywords' even without all the words in your URL. Content, meta title, h1 tag, meta description all come into play for on-page optimization. So you can still cover 90% of the on-page optimization!!

      Originally Posted by xhawkx View Post


      • Will this legality issue still be of great concern if the owner of that domain is not based in U.S/UK/Canada?
      Yes, companies can come after you from outside of the same country. There are international laws in place when it comes to copyright & trademark issues.
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      • Profile picture of the author Chris W. Sutton
        Here's the other thing... Matthew Cutts has said several times that Google is going to stop putting ANY credence to keywords in the domain. I don't know if Google implemented this in their last update but, if not, it is coming.
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        • Profile picture of the author fluffythewondercat
          Point taken, but Google has backpedaled on a number of things they said they were going to do. Remember when they were going to incorporate all relevant tweets into search results? (Somehow I think they really weren't too familiar with Twitter at that point...)

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          • Profile picture of the author dave_hermansen
            Good point Fluff.. As of today it seems quite obvious that it is beneficial to have your keywords in your domain name!!
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  • Profile picture of the author ShawnSells
    Its always a risk to use a brand name, but it's true many owners won't pursue you...but if they do, all your work will go down the drain.
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  • Profile picture of the author getbizy
    You should be very careful about trademark names
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    • Profile picture of the author Richard Van
      A quick question for the OP. Is there any point building up a business you could lose control of or worse still get sued over at any moment?

      Just because others are currently getting away with it, doesn't make it ok to do and it doesn't mean they'll be getting away with it tomorrow.

      Originally Posted by getbizy View Post

      You should be very careful about trademark names
      What about the sites in your signature?
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      Wibble, bark, my old man's a mushroom etc...

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  • Profile picture of the author xhawkx
    Thanks everyone. Very detailed and helpful replies. I've made up my mind of not using any trademarks in domain names.

    Originally Posted by Alexa Smith

    Are you suggesting that using someone else's trademark in a domain-name would make competition easier? It's not a premise I share ...
    Hmm not really. But I guess then it would require more efforts to get a good position in Google, no?

    Originally Posted by Richard Van

    A quick question for the OP. Is there any point building up a business you could lose control of or worse still get sued over at any moment?
    Surely NO!

    Anyway I would be bugging you guys in new topics as well as there are lots of confusions in my mind about other things.. But the forum is helpful.
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