Following on from the Interflora vs Marks & Spencer case another retailer is upset about AdWords trademark bidding. Handbag retailer Louis Vuitton has lost a court battle with Google in Europes highest court despite initially winning a case in the French courts.
Advocate-General Poiares Maduro said in his legal opinion to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) that “Google has not committed a trademark infringement by allowing advertisers to select keywords corresponding to trademarks.â€
He said that Google’s sponsored links did establish a link between keywords and the advertised sites selling products identical or similar to those covered by the trademarks.
“However, such a link also does not constitute a trademark infringement. In effect, the mere display of relevant sites in response to keywords is not enough to establish a risk of confusion on the part of consumers as to the origin of goods or services,†he said.
“Internet users are aware that not only the site of the trademark owner will appear as a result of a search in Google’s search engine and sometimes they may not even be looking for that site.â€
The thorny issue of brand bidding isn’t going to go away soon and it will be interesting to see how the Interflora case pans out.
Patrick Altoft is Director of Search at Leeds based digital & SEO agency Branded3. Patrick also runs Blogstorm.You can get our blog posts delivered for free by email every day - simply add your email address to the box below or alternatively grab the RSS feed.
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Google has really been getting there point across lately i guess there influence in the world is showing now.
This issue is definitely one which is going to continue to be debated hotly over the next few years. Interestingly here, the bold statement by Maduro that “Internet users are aware that not only the site of the trademark owner will appear as a result of a search in Google’s search engine†I think probably overlooks a large proportion of “Internet users†who are less familiar with the way Google’s sponsored links function. I imagine that, the “risk of confusion on the part of consumers as to the origin of goods or services†varies considerably among different groups of users. I do wonder how long it will be before Google are sued by a consumer who has mistakenly bought something of high value from a sponsored link which turns out to be a fake “keyword trademarked†site.
Will there be better ways in the future to ensure a user can completely trust the authenticity of “keyword trademarked†websites in Google’s sponsored links? Perhaps the simple thing here would be for Google to employ a symbol which appears next to the authentic “Interflora†or “Louis Vuitton†result, making it clear which is the real thing?
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ITs Google man, it can win any battle and any case in any country, the giant search engine.
More comments from tag44We hold the trade mark for Trentan Sheds and Trentan Log Cabins and also in respect of all other Trentan garden buildings.
If you type in ‘Trentan Sheds’ into Google.co.uk at the top of the page are two companies who have in the writing ‘Show Products from Garden Buildings Direct for Trentan Sheds’.
Our actual trade mark is used in the advert not just appearing for the search term, which I don’t have a problem with. What I do have a problem with is these firms including in their adverts inferring they can buy our trade marked Trentan Sheds from them.
This is different to M&S as they do not include ‘Interflora’ in their ads.
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