Trademark name and Squidoo

3 replies
I'm working on several Squidoo lenses for the upcoming year. One thing I've noticed is that a lot of people use trademark names as the address to their the squidoo lenses. I know that's a "no no" for a regular domain name. Just curious, why is it that you can get away with that on Squidoo but not in a regular domain? Or, is it also a "no no" on Squidoo, too?
#squidoo #trademark
  • Profile picture of the author Teravel
    I never really understood why people say "Using Trademarked Names in your Domain is a no-no". Let me explain why, and show some examples as to why I think this is a bogus assumption.

    Taking a trip over to Amazon, I can find hundreds of thousands of products from various businesses with trademarked names. At the time of this writing, a deal is going on for Cuisinart Immersion Hand blenders. Cuisinart is a trademarked name, one that has been around for longer than I can remember.

    Heading over to Google, we can input "Cuisinart Review" (no quotes on the search) to get some information about the Cuisinart products. Amazingly enough, the first page is Cuisinartreviews (.com). The theme is boring, theres more Adsense ads and Amazon links than actual content, yet they hold the first position for the term "Cuisinart Review".

    You would think that Cuisinart would take action against this person in order to get the first position on their trademarked name. Truth is, they want this person to sell their products. The more sales that person gets, the more money Amazon and Cuisinart get.

    Moving on to why Trademarked names are allowed with Squidoo... Lets say you have a website with reviews and information about products from a single trademarked business. You decide to go with keywords instead of a trademarked domain. You then start posting your content and reviews. Most SEO guides would tell you to name the page after the title of the content being published. If your content is titled "[Trademark] Review - [add keyword description here]" then your page would be named the same, thus having the trademark in the page title. This is the same thing you are doing when you post information on a Squidoo.

    Interesting point of note:
    Hubpages is much like Squidoo, and could be a great source of traffic if you are getting good results from Squidoo.
    Signature

    "Failure is feedback. Feedback is the breakfast of champions." -Fortune Cookie

    PLR Packages - WSO

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[5333906].message }}
    • Profile picture of the author LilBlackDress
      The way I look at it is Squidoo is the root domain as in Squidoo.com. So you can add product names as your lens name because it is not the root.

      Same with your blog. Your root domain should not be a product name (you do not have rights to use) but you can add a product name to a blog post or page.

      In your example, the person who has CuisinartReviews.com has it in the root so it is at risk for infringing and that is a no. If they had something like...MamasReviews.com/CuisinartReview it should be ok. And if a vendor is unhappy and requests the page(s)/post(s) be taken down the the rest of the site would be fine.

      With Squidoo you could have Squidoo.com/CuisinartReviews

      Anytime you use a product name in your root unless it is yours or you have permissions you could be at risk.
      Signature

      Pen Name + 8 eBooks + social media sites 4 SALE - PM me (evergreen beauty niche)

      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[5334046].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author SoEasyMoney
    I never thought about Squidoo being the "root" domain but it is. I guess that makes sense now.

    I appreciate the Cuisinart example and I agree wholehartedly with what you are saying. But, just for me, I'm not going to chance spending time and money building up a site and then get a C&D and lose everything. That's just my .02!

    Thanks for the insight, guys!
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[5334199].message }}

Trending Topics