Can i trademark my business name and logo at the same time [Definitive Guide]

Last updated : Sept 21, 2022

Can I trademark my business name and logo?

Business names, product names, logos and labels can all be trademarks. You acquire a trademark by using your mark in commerce—in other words, using it when you conduct your business. For additional protection, you can register a trademark with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

Should you trademark your logo name or both?

Most businesses need to trademark both their business name and logo. They are the cornerstones of almost every brand. If you plan on being in business for any amount of time, you'll be building a brand. You need to trademark your name and logo because they represent your brand.

Can you trademark two things at once?

It should come as no surprise that one trademark application can cover only one mark. In other words, you may not register multiple trademarks in a single application.

How do I add my logo to a trademark?

How to Trademark a Logo. A unique logo can be trademarked by registering it with the USPTO. Anyone can apply online on the USPTO website if the business for which they're authorized to file is principally located inside the U.S. If based outside the U.S., a patent attorney will be required to make the filing.

Should I get a trademark or LLC first?

It is important to get BOTH an LLC and a trademark and it is best to form the LLC BEFORE applying for a trademark. Each offers different protections, and they work together to provide broad protection for your business. It is better to form an LLC before filing a trademark application.

How do I protect my business name and logo?

Trademark. A trademark can protect the name of your business, goods, and services at a national level. Trademarks prevent others in the same (or similar) industry in the United States from using your trademarked names.

Is it worth trademarking a logo?

Trademarks protect words, names, symbols, sounds and colors and distinguish one company's goods and products from another. Trademarking a logo not only protects it from being used by other similar companies, it also protects a company from unknowingly infringing upon an existing logo.

When should you trademark a logo?

To protect your logo, you need a trademark or service mark (trademarks are generally used for products, while service marks are usually applied to services). You should not copyright or patent a logo design.

Does your logo have to match your business name?

No, your logo (or brand) does not have to match your LLC name. Your logo (or business name) is the brand you use to market to your clients, whereas your LLC name is the legal entity name of your firm. They can match, but they do not need to match.

Can you change your logo after trademark?

Once a trademark application has been filed at the trademark registry, the applicant cannot request for changing the logo in a trademark application. A change in the graphical representation of the trademark may be possible if the trademark registry directs the applicant for the same.

How long is a trademark good for?

A federal trademark lasts 10 years from the date of registration, with 10-year renewal terms. Between the fifth and sixth year after the registration date, the registrant must file an affidavit to state that the mark is still in use.

How do I trademark a name and image?

1. Decide on Your Logo Concept.
2. Check for Existing Trademarks Before You Approve the Design.
3. Ensure a Design Distinctive Enough to Trademark.
4. Apply for Your Trade Mark as Soon as Possible.
5. Wait for the trademark to be approved.

Is it worth trademarking a business name?

Names hold power in business. So establishing ownership of and rights to a business name is an important step for businesses that want to ensure a name remains one-of-a-kind. Registering a trademark helps protect a name or brand from intellectual property theft or misuse as a business grows.

Should I own my trademark or should my company?

The party who controls the nature and quality of the goods and services used in connection with the brand should be the trademark owner. This is an important decision and naming the proper owner for purposes of registration is critical to maintaining a valid trademark.

What is the cheapest way to get a trademark?

The basic cost to trademark a business name ranges from $225 to $600 per trademark class. This is the cost to submit your trademark application to the USPTO. The easiest and least expensive way to register your trademark is online, through the USPTO's Trademark Electronic Application System (TEAS).

How do I make sure no one steals my logo?

1. Do a trademark search in USPTO or EUIPO for similar trademarks to make sure yours doesn't conflict with another registered mark.
2. Complete a trademark application.
3. Wait and monitor for progress.

How do I make sure no one steals my brand name?

Your brand is your company's identity, so it's critical to secure it with a trademark, which prevents someone from improperly using your business name or branding. To get a trademark, you'll need to file an application with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

How can I protect my logo legally?

If you want to protect your brand identity you have to register a trademark for your company name, logos, and slogans. By using the trademark symbol, you notify other people that products they use are your property. In order to prevent unauthorized use of your mark by third parties, you have to choose a strong one.

What happens if you don't trademark a logo?

If you do not register your trademark, you will have legal rights only within the geographic areas where you operate. This means you may be able to stop a subsequent user of the mark, even if it is a bigger company, from using the mark in your geographic area only.

What happens if you don't trademark your logo?

There is risk associated with building a business based on brand names or logos that you don't own. There's risk that you'll have to pay out royalties to someone else down the road. There's risk you'll have to rebrand and lose some of that brand equity you've built up.

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hey hey party people welcome welcome to Rachael Rogers TV I'm Rachael Rodgers and I hope you are enjoying this lovely fall day I'm here in New York where we're about to get into some serious apple picking and you know everything is flavored pumpkin which is awesome today I would answer a question for you that I have been answering for many years at least three times a week every single week for essentially the last five years so I'm gonna dive into this question today because obviously it's about that time that I finally got around to doing a Rachael Rogers TV episode on it so today I'm going to answer the question should I trademark my logo or my business name now if you are a business owner that is ready to take action on protecting your brand the way that you're gonna do that is with trademark registration so most of my clients when they are ready to take action and protect their brand their next question is what things should I do first right and usually the question is around should I register my company name or should I register of the logo that has the company name in it okay so there are a couple of ways that I evaluate in this situation now you know if we were all big corporations and had endless legal budgets then we would just register both the company name and the logo that is the ideal way to get the maximum amount of trademark protection for your brand however most of my clients and myself included are small businesses right so we have limited legal budgets and so we need to really maximize what we're spending to get the maximum amount of protection for the least amount of money and that's what I help my clients do so when we're looking at a company that has a great company name they need to protect but then they also have a logo how do we decide these are the factors that I look at so when you are thinking about whether to start by registering the trademark for your company name or whether to start by registering the trademark for your logo the biggest thing you want to consider is what is making the bigger impact with your customers are your customers more impacted and more connected to your company name or are they more connected to your logo now there is a rule of thumb here typically if you're in a product based business where you are selling a physical product that has your logo on it or has your logo on the packaging then your logo is usually making the bigger impact with your customers right because they are seeing your product on a shelf with a bunch of other products or they're getting it in the mail with all kinds of packaging with your logo on it so the logo tends to be more impactful and a really big deal for physical products so if you're selling a physical product where whether it's you know a t-shirt design where the logo better than the t-shirt or whether it's a candle and the logos on the packaging for the candle the logo is making a big impact and you're spending a ton of money right to manufacture all of those products with your logo on it so your logo becomes a really big deal and it's really really important to protect it in that case however if you are in a service business usually it's your company name that is making the bigger impact service businesses tend to get their clients through you know the internet right so you're getting your clients online they're coming to your website and they're seeing your company name your company name is usually a part of or is your domain name right so that's the address that they're typing in when they're looking for you and then your company name is also on your business cards it's on your marketing materials that's really what they're connecting with right and service businesses tend to get a lot of their customers through referrals so that means that you know Joe Schmoe is telling their friends hey you should hire Rogers collective or whatever the name of your company is right so if you are in a product based business then the logo is likely the more important trademark that you need to protect to begin and if you are in a service business then more than likely your company name is more important to start with if you are in a business where you truly feel that both your logo and your company name are equally important and equally impactful on your customers then the only way to avoid registering both the logo and the company name totally depends on what your logo looks like it is possible to get a two-for-one deal where you get protection for your company name and your logo in one trademark application but only where the only words that appear in your actual trademark are your company name if your company name are the only words or numbers or punctuation that are included in your logo design then you will get protection for those words so the company the words that make up your company name you'll get protection for those as part of the logo design right so if I registered the logo for Rogers collective that I would have protection for the words Rogers collective as well however the problem comes in when you have a logo that has other words numbers or punctuation in it in addition to your company name for example this Rogers collective logo has the company name Roger's collective but it's also got our tagline right intelligent law for innovative business the problem with that is is that we're not going to have protection for just the words Rogers collective we'd have protection for the words Rogers collective intelligent law for innovative business right so if someone else wanted to come along and you know create a brand that was really similar and let's say they wanted to be called smart Drew's collective okay for lack of a better example if they wanted to because it's called something really close to our brand name they would be able to point to those additional words in our trademark application and say that is enough to differentiate smokers collective from Rogers collective intelligent law for innovative business you get what I mean so that is the reason why you can only do one application and get that two-for-one deal where you get protection for both your logo and your company name if you have a logo that only has your company name in it and no other words the other item that you may want to consider when you're deciding whether to register your company name or your logo is are you super committed to this logo or are you the type of person that is gonna want to change your logo every six months or every two years or really rather often right when you register your trademark it is not a super cheap process right it costs money it is an investment in an asset for your business trademark protection is actually something that you only want to invest in if this is something that you are committed to long term so if you're committed to your company name long term then you should go ahead and register that if you are committed to your logo long term then that is something else that you should consider protecting you register your trademarks you have protection for many years to come right so there's no point in registering your logo if you know that you'r

Thanks for your comment Ute Tharpe, have a nice day.
- Kiesha Wernex, Staff Member

all right so if you clicked on this video then you're probably at a point in your business where you're getting ready to get all of your intellectual property matters in order you're probably prepping up to get your trademarks file and then all of a sudden you're like okay do I just trademark my name or do i trademark my logo can I really do them both and the answer to all of those questions is yes pedal out all my little legal eagles thank you so much for clicking the video my name is Jolene dual-career you can call me Jill D and you're watching my channel where we talk about cannabis business and entrepreneurship from a legal perspective if you're not already subscribed to the channel you can join our awesome little community here on YouTube by smashing that red subscribe button down below on the bottom of this video and hitting that little bell button so you can get notified every single time I post a new video here on YouTube if you really want to get in the action though you can join my exclusive text community by texting this number right here and it actually does come through to me and I do respond to all of my text messages so go ahead and join text me and say hey this week's video is a follow-up to some of the trademark videos I've done in the past you can catch them here and here and one of the most frequently asked questions I get in response to those videos are whether or not someone should file a trademark application for both their name and their logo and my answer to that question is always a resounding yes but it also depends sometimes it's not economically feasible to file a trademark application for both your name and the local at the same time I understand it I run small businesses and sometimes your budget just does not allow for all of this extravagant IP protection strategy all at the same time sometimes you have to space it out a little bit if you know what I mean and stretch the dollar I get it so in this video I'm gonna go through the reasons why you would want to file a trademark application for your name and the reasons why you would want to file a trademark application for your logo and then you can process this information and figure out what's the most important to you and based on that information you can go ahead and file the most appropriate application for you so first your logo so trademarking your logo when I talk about trademarking I'm talking about the process that you go through with the United States Patent and Trademark Office the federal process I'm not talking about the state process I could do a whole other separate video on trademarking with your State but in all of these videos I'm specifically talking about the federal prostitute that in mind so there's no confusion about it alright so with your logo what is your logo basically it's a visual depiction a design or some sort of symbol that identifies your goods your services or your brand if you will this symbol is basically used to promote the public's Association of that symbol or design with your brand one of the main reasons that you would want to get a trademark for your logo is to protect yourself from other people using your logo without your permission or confusing the public about the identity of your brand and basically aligning themselves with your brand without your permission you wouldn't have control over how that logo is then used to a certain extent so especially in situations where your logo is one of the more prominent features of your brand and it's something that the public really identifies your brand as and they look to that logo and they know it's you then I would want to prioritize the trademark filing for the logo and that would help to mitigate any sort of risk of anybody misappropriating your logo and using it without your permission and sort of you know getting you a little bit more protection in that department so when it comes to social media having the protection can really help you in situations where people are using your logo on social media accounts without your permission have you ever noticed how certain celebrity names and certain brands you never see them reposted on social media and if you do see them sometimes it's taken down immediately intellectual property protection and strategies are a very very powerful tool first stuff like that if it's done correctly so when it comes to trade marking your name you would have somewhat of a similar breakdown you want to secure your actual name to prevent anyone else from using the same name or a very very similar name to yours in the same industry that you're operating your business in your name is actually separate and distinct from your logo so your name is just your name and your logo is just your logo so if your actual name is the more prominent thing when compared to your logo then you might want to consider filing the trademark application for your name first before your logo if that's what's the most important thing out of the two so again if you have to make the decision if you have to make a choice you need to really figure out which one of the two are the most important to you and take it from there but if you need any more detailed information on trademarking and the process for trademarking i have videos that are linked below in the description box for you and they're linked at the end of the video so if you're in a position where you can file a trademark application for both your name and your logo then great go ahead and do so that's awesome but don't stop there go ahead and look at other areas of your business that you think deserve intellectual property protection I actually have an entire video where I go over trademark patents copyrights trade secrets and a whole bunch of different strategies for protecting your business's intellectual property and these are intangible assets I always say that but they're worth protecting in that video I also have a link to a free workbook and I'll go ahead and link it here to for you in the cards that you can download to get you exercising a little bit and putting all of your intellectual property matters on paper so you can have a high level overview of the things that you need to consider protecting from an intellectual property standpoint the workbook really does help you get organized and it's free to download so now it's time to shout out my viewer of the week thank you so much for watching commenting and for your support I truly truly truly appreciate it if you want to be featured on a video and for me to shout you out please go ahead and leave your I G handle down in the comments and take a screenshot of this video posted to your IG story and tag me so I can follow you back and I can see you and then next week I will pick someone randomly to shout out alright guys please be safe out there and please exercise social distancing during this lockdown I hope you guys are doing well and holding up and trying to stay active and productive during this time I know is super super difficult I'm losing my mind oh my god but if you have any questions at all feel free to hit me up in the comments hit me up on a DM

Thanks Collin your participation is very much appreciated
- Kiesha Wernex

About the author

Kiesha Wernex

I've studied figurational sociology at Morehouse School of Medicine in Atlanta and I am an expert in accelerator physics. I usually feel jealous. My previous job was electromechanical equipment assembler I held this position for 19 years, I love talking about eating and pilates. Huge fan of Colin Kaepernick I practice flag football and collect basketball cards.