How Singapore businesses can nail their brands' worth online – Part One
BY CONNIE HON
What is the online value of your business? This is the most relevant question to any business big or small, now that we are in this mobile Internet day and age. Once upon a time during the dotcom boom, ground businesses may have envied online companies in their attainment of rapid fame and fortune. As the dotcom bubble burst in 2001, failed dotcoms scrambled to sell scraps of what they were worth online, to the bemusement of bricks and mortar.
Noteworthy was the value of their businesses that remained before they were sold off. These valuations were the results of the quantifying of each business’s tangible and intangible assets including online and offline brand reputation, potential for growth and remaining goodwill that they had at that time with their stakeholders.
For local businesses here in Singapore, moving your business online between then and now was and still is an inevitable and essential move that you know would increase the value of your business. Value that you could only qualify with adjectives: customers who want to know more about your business run a search online and find your online presence “insightful”, “informative” and “exciting”; the higher you place on search results, the more “established” your company is; the more number of likes that you receive through social media tells everyone that you are more “popular”, “experienced” and “reliable”.
Your business welcomes all the good valuations locally, regionally, even globally, but now you are caught in a catch-22 situation: you want to increase the value of your business, yet the more valuable your business is, the higher the possibility of ill meaning attention rushing in to diminish its value.
What are the threats facing your online presence?
Business owners in Singapore do take note: You have worked very hard to build up value and differentiate your business from others. Naturally you do not wish for the value of your businesses to be easily diluted or easily shared with profiteering entities. Yet, there are many ways in which your brand may be compromised and every day, tactics are evolved to try to catch unsuspecting businesses off-guard.
• Cybersquatting – Cybersquatters register domain names that contain marks of famous brands with hopes of selling them to the original companies at much higher prices than what they paid for. Visit these websites: www.singaporeairlines.sg (singaporeairlines.com), www.ocbcbank.com (ocbc.com) and www.capland.com (capitaland.com)
• Typosquatting – Typosquatters register mistypes of your brand name with various domain extensions such as www.osin.com (osim.com), www.breatalk.com (breadtalk.com), www.creatif.com (creative.com), www.tigerpalm.com (tigerbalm.com) and commonly operate them as phishing sites. Pepsico is one company highly aware of typosquats and registered www.pep.si for themselves.
• Domain name scams – an email made to look as though it came from a legitimate company shocks you into registering domain names with them and you pay but do not get anything registered.
In fact, if you perform an online search of your brand name and product names in as many different permutations as you can think of, you will probably see them popping up on sites that are not owned by you. Some of these could be websites of genuine businesses that may or may not be involved in the same trade as yours.
In these cases, you generally will not expect to own these domain addresses. Take McDelivery for example. It was found that Mcdelivery.com was registered in the year 2000 by registrant Mc Parcel Delivery, a courier service operating in the State of Washington, USA. Even if this domain name would have been an ideal match to McDonald’s famous fast food delivery service that first succeeded in Singapore in 2005, the chance of a successful domain recovery effort from McDonald’s would have been nil had it tried.
Back to your online investigation of who (other than yourself) uses your brand name. You may have come across websites that have ill meaning intentions towards your business. Tapping on the popularity and awareness of your brand, these sites divert some of your traffic away to them; create a sense of falsehood about your reputation or phish for information from your audience.
Worse, those sites may harm your brand, your product or your customers. These online threats are very real, detrimental to your reputation and have the effect of eroding the value of your brand. Most recently on 24 July 2013 and 30 July 2013, DBS Bank released statements that their Internet banking site was being compromised.
Five websites that were identified to be purely phishing sites were set up by perpetrators with the sole intention of obtaining the login information and passwords of unsuspecting DBS Internet banking users. To the untrained eye, these sites looked frighteningly identical to DBS’s Internet banking landing page. These sites have since been removed.
How do you overcome these threats and increase the value of your brand online?
Building up the value of your brand requires both advancement and defense, online and offline. A modern day Sun Tzu would have said the same. As your business pushes forth in groundwork with R&D, product research, product refinement, marketing efforts, promotions; supported with extensive training and great customer service, you defend with patent applications, copyrighting, trademark registrations, active market research, communications and online security.
You want to gain as much ground as possible and grow your share of the pie. You do not wish to be impeded, at least not in the wake of your stride. You must build a strong defense to cover your tracks or ideally, even before you have begun your moves.
At this point, you want to rely on trusted service providers whom you have worked with or have heard of. Service providers who are marketing or branding professionals; companies who designed or hosted your websites or provided you with email hosting services; facilitators who built your IT infrastructure or wired you up for business; providers of your POS (point-of-sale) systems; even law firms who offered you sound legal advice.
Speak to these professionals about securing or increasing the value of your brand online. They want your business to grow and to grow securely as much as you do.
With their help, explore how to increase consumers’ trust in your e-commerce sites and how to make their shopping experience fluid yet secure; how to minimize and monitor the possibility of external threats in every shape and form; what to do to ensure that you never spam your genuine customers or deny them access to you; how to ensure that your brand is protected before anyone infringes upon it; how to mark your territory on a large scale and how to plant your brands in place before anyone else.
Register your trademark with IPOS (Intellectual Property Office of Singapore) so that your mark gains a statutory monopoly that you may use in online and offline protection of your brand.
Ask the right questions, formulate the appropriate plans and execute them before you tap into a new market and before your new products ply through their respective markets. Stay a step ahead of perpetrators and protect the value of your brand and business.
Coming up in the next article, find out what the next BIG thing on the Internet is and how it affects you as a business owner. This article is first in a series of three to help inform local businesses of current and upcoming challenges on the Internet.
Access IPOS http://www.ipos.gov.sg/
View attacks to DBS’s IB security http://www.dbs.com/security/Pages/security-alerts-news.aspx
The views expressed in this column are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect this publication's view, and this article is not edited by Singapore Business Review. The author was not remunerated for this article.
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How Singapore businesses can nail their brands' worth online – Part two
New gTLDs will change the way people find information on the Internet and how businesses plan and structure their online presence. Virtually every organization with an online presence could be affected in some way – ICANN 41, June 2011, Singapore
From 19-24 June 2011, ICANN held its 41st meeting in Singapore. ICANN is The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, a non-profit U.S. organization that oversees a number of Internet-related tasks.
The meeting announced this to the world: ICANN Board’s approval of the new gTLD project, a revolutionary project for the Internet that allowed any organization with enough financial backup to come forth with their applications of new gTLDs (generic Top Level Domains). It was the invitation for anyone to come up with a dot anything, literally speaking.
Look at your website address in a new light
Here in Singapore most of us are used to seeing domain addresses ending in .com, .com.sg and .sg since .COM gTLD was launched in 1984 and SGNIC rolled out .SG ccTLDs in the year 1997. gTLD stands for generic Top Level Domain while ccTLD stands for country code Top Level Domain.
SGNIC is the appointed national registry responsible for authorizing and regulating the registration, administration and management of domain addresses ending in .sg.
To date, there are 23 gTLDs (.com .net .org .biz .jobs .mobi .asia .xxx .travel, etc) and more than 276 ccTLDs (.sg .my .in .id .th .vn .la .ph .hk .jp .kr .au .nz etc) each regulated by their own registries.
Do note that the consideration of domain addresses is firstly its TLD (Top Level Domain). It is crucial for you to take a renewed look at your current website address. Do regard domain addresses from right to left; firstly what its TLD is, secondly by the string of text left of the dot, and so on.
A domain is either registered to you or unavailable to you
These days, a domain address is not just a virtual address where companies or individuals “reside” or are found. Domain addresses also have financial value just like physical properties do in the real world.
This means that besides genuine business owners who just want to register one domain address with their brand to host their website, there exist professional domainers who register hundreds of domain addresses purely for the purposes of investment and trading.
They typically register the domains that they feel will have positive ROI and “hold on” to these, with the hope of eventually selling some of these domains to companies who are willing to buy in the secondary domain name market. For example, www.changiairport.sg, www.tigerbeer.com and www.banyantree.com.
The secondary domain name market contains all sorts of domain names. Businesses may too try to sell their domain names here if there are bad stigma or history attached to those domains. Many generic domain names are valuable in the secondary domain name market because by their generic nature, they attract lots of visitor traffic on the Internet.
The website www.Sneakers.com for example attracts hundreds of thousands of unique visitors monthly. A sneaker maker such as Nike or Adidas could purchase the domain sneakers.com and as a bonus, point its visitors to Nike.com or Adidas.com.
On 4 July 2013, the domain accounts.com fetched €145,000 in an online auction while on 26 July 2013 child.org and forest.com were put up for auction at the asking prices of US$10,000 and €15,000 respectively. Singapore.co is currently offered at USD100,000.
Registries want to issue domain names to genuine business owners
Most Registries strictly prohibit the registration of domain names for speculative purposes and enforce policies in order to protect genuine owners of brands and trademarks.
For example, THNIC, Thai Registry for .CO.TH domain addresses, requires that brand and trademark owners (registrants) register domain names identical to their brands or trademarks, and on top of that, to produce certifications in support of their claims of ownership.
Japan Registry Service forbids Japanese-registered companies from registering more than one .CO.JP domain. AUNIC, Australian Registry for .COM.AU domains, has a strict requirement that registrants must be Australian registered companies and operate their businesses from within Australia.
SGNIC introduced a pilot scheme in May this year, requiring that the administrative contacts of registrants registering .SG domain addresses go through a verification process so as to minimize identity theft incidences and the use of fake identities.
Registrations of domain addresses are subject to limitations imposed by ICANN and guidelines from Registries. These constraints protect the genuine brand owners and also help to lower speculation in the secondary domain name market.
If genuine brand owners register their brands or trademarks with the new gTLDs before the public does and if further restrictions apply to the public, the number of domains that can be registered by speculative members of the public is less.
One of the biggest secondary domain auction sites Sedo.com reported that in the year 2011 alone, nearly 40,000 domain transactions occurred, with transacted sales dollars amounting to US$84.5 million. Most of the higher priced domains transacted were naturally the ever-popular .COMs.
However, Sedo.com reported growths in transaction volumes of .CO (ccTLD for Columbia) and .ME (ccTLD for Montenegro) among other TLDs. This meant that relatively new TLDs were regarded with keener interest than before.
Imagine if each new gTLD was unregulated, released for public registration at will and adds 1,000 domains annually to the secondary domain name market. Now multiply that by the actual number of new gTLDs that may be released to the public: 700 and you will understand why the new gTLDs are such a big deal.
When can you register .gTLD?
The last of 1,930 new gTLD applications was accepted by ICANN on 30 May 2012. After a series of comprehensive and long drawn-out verification processes, the current number of verified new gTLDs stands at 1,377 with more in the pipeline.
Out of the 1,930 new gTLDs, an estimated 600 are brand-TLDs owned and operated by large corporations for their own use for example, .CANON and .MATTEL.
Over the course of the next 2 years or so, most gTLDs meant for use by businesses and by the public will be released for registration. In fact, the first four gTLDs: شبكة (Arabic for "Web or Network"), .онлайн (Russian for "Online"), .сайт(Russian for "Web site") and .游戏 (Chinese for "Game") are expected to be available for registration from 15 October 2013.
Some business owners here in Singapore may want to look out for these for the purpose of defensive domain registrations or because you are planning to expand your businesses to these geographical regions.
You, the business owner, are now advised to identify which new gTLDs are applicable for your business. This is because while some gTLDs are very applicable for your business, most mildly apply; a few are entirely off.
For example, if you are a furniture retailer, you may want to register your brand with the TLDs .FURNITURE, .CASA and .LIVING, but you do not need to register your brand with .AUTO or .FIRE. For details to these, speak with your current service provider.
After you have identified which gTLDs are relevant for your business, keep track of each of them to find out when registration for either sunrise or general launch begins. Sunrise registrations are for brand owners to register their brand domains; general launch registrations are for the registration of generic domain names.
Near the start of registration of each new gTLD, registration conditions and pricing details will be released. Soon you will be on your way to owning .gTLD. Meanwhile, let us wait in patience for the Internet is about to get very, very interesting.
This article is second in a series of three to help inform local businesses of current and upcoming challenges on the Internet.
How Singapore businesses can nail their brands' worth online – Part three
In previous parts of this series, we discussed why a domain address can be your strength, your weakness, an opportunity or a threat to your business locally, regionally and globally. You understand why having a defensive and expansive portfolio of domain names is important for your business.
We also touched upon what new gTLDs (generic Top Level Domains) are, that it is the next new wave happening on the Internet and that your business should get involved. Here is why you should hop on to fast track new gTLD registrations.
Get the domain name that you want
Each new gTLD is a new chance for individuals, SMEs and large companies to finally get the domain addresses that they want. Remember when you tried to register your first choice of domain name with .COM, .NET, .COM.SG and .SG but could not because they were already taken?
You then investigated for the availability of your second, third, fourth or latter choices, finally settling reluctantly on a domain address that was far too long, too far off from your brand name, difficult for your customers and even yourself to recall, and just was not good enough.
By registering your domain name with the new gTLDs, you can finally secure the domain address that your business deserves. One aim of the new gTLD project is to empower brand owners and SMEs (Small Medium Enterprises) with the ability to get the domain name they want.
Homegrown favorite Killiney Kopitiam (currently killiney-kopitiam.com)can finally register:
www.kk.food and add them to their current portfolio of domain names (online real estate).
Customers can understand easily what these businesses sell at a glance www.lush.furniture (currently lush-lush.com)
www.lush.beauty (currently lush.com)
www.lush.radio (currently not having its own website) and
www.lush.spa (currently not having a unique website)
Local businesses that have taken on non-traditional English markets can include in their domain portfolio TLDs such as
机构 (Chinese for organization)
セール (Japanese for sale)
ابوظبي (Arabic for Abu Dhabi), etc.
If you are wondering how much to budget for the additional new domain addresses, unfortunately no prices have been released. Registration prices and other relevant prices of each new gTLD are only released by its respective Registry as and when the new gTLD opens for registration.
Therefore it is advisable that you create a watchlist of new gTLDs that are relevant for your business and based on what you currently spend per year on domain renewals, extrapolate a ballpark budget for registrations of new domain names.
Get the domain name you want before others
If you own a registered trademark, in other words, if you have registered your brand as a trademark with either IPOS (Intellectual Property Office of Singapore) or trademark offices of other jurisdictions at national-level, you can get to register your domain name before anybody else by making use of the sunrise phase of each new top level domain. Non trademark holders unfortunately can only wait to register in the general launch phase.
A brief explanation about sunrise and general launch phases: any new top level domain has at least two phases in their lifecycle – sunrise phase and general launch phase. The sunrise phase usually gives priority to trademark owners to register their trademark domain names before the public does.
To register each trademark as the top level domain name, trademark owners may be required to submit to each Registry documents such as business registration certificates, trademark registration certificates, photographic evidence of those trademarks being used - these evidence may be images of print brochures or annual reports; and make payment of sunrise application fees over and above domain registration fees.
The sunrise application fee goes to the Registry or its validation agent to verify your trademark data and documents. For each sunrise application the trademark owner has to submit these documents and make payment of both fees.
The general launch phase is registration phase for the public or companies without registered trademarks. In this phase, usually business registration certificate and proof of administrative contacts are required or none at all. There is no sunrise application fee to pay; only registration fees need apply.
How to?
If you own a registered trademark, have identified at least five new top level domains that you are interested in and would like to save money for your company, you may make use of ICANN’s less known initiative, TMCH (Trademark Clearinghouse). TMCH carries out the verification work of trademark data in place of all new gTLD Registries.
Therefore, when trademark owners wish to apply for their trademark top level domains in their watchlist, they do not have to submit trademark information over and over again and do not have to pay sunrise applications fees each time.
In addition to this, TMCH provides an alert service that applies only to trademark owners who have submitted their trademarks with TMCH. TMCH will alert trademark owners if any third party were to register a domain (with any new gTLD Registry) identical to their trademarks deposited with TMCH. This alert service is triggered if a third party “intrusion” occurs within the first 90 days of general launch phase.
We illustrate with the following fictitious example:
IP Mirror Pte Ltd has a registered trademark, “IP Mirror” and has identified a list of five new gTLDs to register their trademark top level domains with.
These are: クラウド (cloud), 网络 (web), TECH, SITE and LLC.
IP Mirror Pte Ltd has to wait for the sunrise phase of each of these TLDs to kick off in order to register its trademark top level domains. It is willing to wait but not willing to be hassled with the trouble of submitting trademark documents five times.
It comes to know about Trademark Clearinghouse and its function in verifying trademark documents on behalf of all Registries. Therefore, IP Mirror Pte Ltd decides to submit its trademark information to a Trademark Clearinghouse agent who then processes its TMCH submission.
The trademark “IP Mirror” is successfully verified by TMCH and is protected for a period of three years starting from 1 August 2013. IP Mirror Pte Ltd selected this period of three years as it understood that these five new gTLDs are on a queue to offer registration and would start taking registrations within 2 years or so.
If IP Mirror Pte Ltd’s trademark registration with IPOS expires and is renewed within the three years at TMCH, it needs to update this information with TMCH.
The gTLD 游戏 begins its 30-day sunrise phase from 15 October – 15 November 2013. IP Mirror Pte Ltd has not chosen 游戏 to be in its watchlist and so does not do anything. After the sunrise phase passes, the general launch phase begins.
On 30 November 2013, IP Mirror Pte Ltd receives notification from TMCH that someone elsewhere in the world has registered ipmirror.游戏. IP Mirror Pte Ltd analyses that their trademark “IP Mirror” is protected under classifications 38 and 42 , and the registrant’s intended use of ipmirror.游戏infringes on “IP Mirror”’s trademark protection under these two classes. IP Mirror Pte Ltd therefore decides to dispute this registration.
To register your trademark with TMCH, enquire with your local trademark clearinghouse (TMCH) agent, website manager or web hosting provider.
Singapore business owners, take action!
From the last quarter of 2013 and onwards for the next 2-3 years, business owners will see wave after wave of new generic top level domains sweeping through the Internet, altering the way consumers locate information.
Businesses will shift their naming of online domains; make use of new gTLDs in classifying their businesses and help customers understand their businesses at first glance. You will see these new domain addresses in mailers, on television and print advertisements and on the Internet.
Brands will inform you that they are now mrbean.soy; that you may preview genuine collections from latest chanel or you may enter a contest on sg-promotions.bmw in order to qualify for a free test drive on the BMW i3 in Singapore.
We would very much like local businesses to be riding on the crest of each wave and be at the forefront of this revolution on the Internet. It would be quite a shame and mismatch of expectations of ourselves if we had not.
After all, we are ranked first in Asia for most network-ready country , No.1 worldwide for the ease of doing business by the World Bank for 7 years running and first in the world for having the best protection of intellectual property.
It is time that our local businesses step up in protection of our Online Intellectual Property. The new generic top level domains and trademark clearinghouse are ready tools waiting for us to pick up on.
Owning a brand or a trademark does not automatically delegate you with the right to its domain name. Domain names are still on a first-come-first-serve basis. Now that you are armed with these knowledge and tools however, you are in a better position to know what to do.
Speak to your service provider about domain portfolio consolidation, the new gTLDs and TMCH today.
This article is last in a series of three to help inform local businesses of current and upcoming challenges on the Internet.
References:
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
IPOS Classification 38: Electronic communications
IPOS Classification 42: Design and development of computer software
Global Information Technology Report 2009-2010
Investvine.com. 2013-01-28
The Global Competitiveness Report 2009-2010
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