A few weeks ago, I received a notice from Google’s legal support team that one of our franchise clients’ Google Ads extension infringed on trademark rights.

That notice didn’t upset me.

It happened; I’ve been through this cycle before.

As is normal and expected, Google is limiting the number of ad impressions for these extensions.

Not that I have any distrust of Google, but I’ve been doing it for over 20 years and knew a long time ago that trusting but verifying is a good policy.

This is not an article about beating trademarks or trademark hooligans, but rather encouraging you to challenge the system.

With due diligence, patience, and a fair and calm attitude, ad restrictions and vetoes are possible.

Spoiler: After weeks of email wars, our appeal finally wins, and our customers can run ads without restrictions. Read on to find out how we did it.

controversy

The first thing I did after receiving an initial trademark infringement notice from Google Ads was to review Google’s trademark policy. I found this and this very helpful.

Then, go to the USPTO website and search for this offending term to verify that it does have a trademark – it turns out it does.

To complicate matters, I found that there were several variations of the term and many claimants.

So, I sent another email to Google Ads asking for clarification on which organization they were protecting (confusing why they didn’t provide this in their initial notice).

After several exchanges, they provided me with an email from Greenpeace personnel suggesting that I follow up with them directly.

Yes, that Greenpeace. I admit that that alone is a bit scary.

Still, believe – but verify.

I went back to https://www.uspto.gov/trademark, but this time I provided details to narrow down the results and hoped to be able to share something specific with my clients to better explain the situation.

To my surprise, the USPTO website does not show anything linking Greenpeace to the trademark that my client was penalized for being penalized by Google.

None – like nada, zip, zilch, zippo, zero.

The email Google gave me, my contact with the person was bounced and could not be delivered.

In the course of my investigation, I found the following……

  • The alleged trademark holder (Greenpeace) never filed a (necessary) complaint.
  • Although the trademark is legal, Google says it does not belong to Greenpeace.
  • Trademarks don’t need to be registered to be valid (crazy, right?). read here).
  • Google doesn’t follow its policies (surprised?) ）。
  • Many Google employees are preaching the company’s line – saying a lot, but making very few actionable or actionable statements.
  • During this appeal, my client’s ads were banned for several weeks, and while Google investigated the false trademark complaint, they could lose an unknown amount of market share and revenue that would go to competitors.

How did it end?

So, at this point you might be wondering how it all ended?

Hello Chris,

I am here to provide some additional information and solutions to this case:

Please note that trademark rights in the United States and many other countries may arise based on the use of trademarks in business; No registration is required. However, after reviewing our archived complaints and your client’s scope of business, we determined that the advertisement in question should not be subject to our trademark policy. For disputed trademark complaints, we have taken steps to ensure that they are not currently and will not be disapproved in the future.

If you have any further questions, please let us know.