Protecting Your Brand on the Internet
by Adam G. Southam

At this very moment anyone can purchase your product on the internet. If you don't think so, go to any search engine, type in your brand name and you will find websites like just4hair.com, vipsalononline.com, drugstore.com, popehair.com, beautybuys.com and hundreds, sometimes thousands more who are selling online right now.

If this doesn't panic you, it should. Because more and more salon owners and stylists will see and hear how they are loosing sales to nepharious back door merchants, and the cache and mystique of your product will quickly erode. Remember Vidal Sassoon? They were lucky but there will not be any room on the shelves of Target when the perceived value of your product is gone and your salons and stylists don't want to carry your product.

Consumers will buy your product online whether you like it or not and will do so to the detriment of your brand -- buying discounted, discontinued, diluted or imitation products that can leave the customer dissatisfied and disenchanted. Even worse, without a professional recommendation consumers may buy the wrong product for the wrong purpose. Moreover, if the product is authentic and is sold at a discount, the value of your brand is being destroyed

If this seems like a bleak outlook that's because it is. Unless you are willing to hire a force of internet cops and a battalion of lawyers who will be challenged with squashing internet retailers on American and foreign soil, you will be in trouble. Merchants will proliferate to meet the needs of your consumers if you don't.

How to save your brand:

  1. Be aggressive and proactive;
  2. Budget marketing dollars specifically for brand protection;
  3. Secure all internet domain names relevant to your brand name in every country your brand is sold. Litigate those who infringe upon your intellectual property in this regard.
  4. Use search engine optimization services to guarantee top placement in all search engines.
  5. Include your website address on all advertisements, collateral, and packaging.
  6. Make sure that salons, stylist and consumers have no reason to purchase your product from anyone other then you.
  7. Make sure your customers understand the guarantees and benefits of purchasing authentic products from authorized sources.
  8. It doesn't matter what you want - find out what your distributors, salons and consumers want, then do it!
  9. You should be the only intuitive destination for anyone wanting your product. If you are not giving them what they want, find a way to do it that thwarts diversion and builds distributor, salon and consumer loyalty.
  10. Lastly, serve the consumer by creating a conduit for them to obtain professional recommendations, authentic product, consistent branding, appropriate pricing and the ability to purchase your products online without circumventing any of your channel partners.

Adam Southam is Chairman/CEO of Reshare Corporation, a leading Channel Management Strategy & Software company and can be reached at ags@reshare.com or by telephone at 800-596-3020.