Your application for a trademark becomes a public record. This means that anyone will be able to see your trademark application. If you have not yet secured a domain name you face the risk of someone choosing to register a domain with the same name as you. If the person registering the domain name does not have the same activities on his website, this means that he does not infringe on your trademark. You will therefore not be able to assert any claim against this person and have the domain name transferred to you. It is therefore important to register the domain name or names you want at the same time as you submit your trademark application.

A domain name gives you no rights that entitle you to make a claim against another person who uses the same or similar name. A trademark protection is also valid on the internet. If someone has the domain name that infringes on your trademark you have the right to make a claim against them.

Registering your trademark gives you the sole right to use your distinctive mark for the type of goods or service to which you have registered your trademark. Because the internet has become such an important place to do business it has become even more important to register your trademark. If you have not protected your distinctive mark you cannot prevent others from using it in their marketing and will have no protection against cyber squatting, unauthorised use of Ad-words containing your distinctive mark, typosquatting (URL hijacking), etc.

The time it takes to register a data varies tremendously, depending on whether it is a national application, an application for a community trademark, etc. It will also depend on how many applications arrived at the office concerned at the same time as yours. And application to PRV usually takes a few months and an application to OHIM takes a little longer than six months at the moment. If you want to use your trademark as soon as possible we recommend that you apply to PRV first.

A trademark that has not been registered provides no protection. If you have no protection you cannot prevent others from using your trademark. Nor can you prevent a competitor buying Ad-Words consisting of your trademark. Or think if a competitor buys a domain with wording like yours and links it to their own domain. A non-registered trademark does not provide you with any protection. Proving incorporation of a trademark is an extremely expensive process, which only provides protection to the geographical area for which it is incorporated.

Registering a trademark gives you the right to prevent others from using your distinctive mark. A domain does not constitute a right. A domain name simply functions as an address.

When you apply for a trademark you must also specify the activity which is to be protected by the trademark. As far as trademarks are concerned it was decided to divide them up into goods and services. Goods are divided into 34 different classes and services into 11 classes. In order for confusion and thus infringement to have occurred, the person one believes has perpetrated an infringement has to be in a similar business to the one to which you have protection, i.e. be in the same class or a so-called cross class.