Part 2: The art of acting before too much damage is done

You and your colleagues invest a lot of time, energy, and money in building and nursing your brand for your customers and potential customers.

Are you aware of whether or not you simultaneously are facing less benevolent parts working against you?

Today there are repeat reports about issues such as piracy, brand infringement, and reputation parasitism, where domains are used as a tactical means. As an online retailer or a premium brand, you do not want to end up in the situation where someone registers a domain name similar to yours, selling pirated copies. As a bank you do not want to risk someone mirroring your site and attempting to gain access to sensitive information.

Domain names are used as a means of digital fraud and brand infringement, which can affect companies of all sizes and in all branches as well as cause major financial damage.

There are several examples, and they illustrate that monitoring now is an essential part of a successful brand and marketing strategy. 

It is important to ensure that you are quickly informed if someone registers your name as a domain name – and that you have the prerequisites for acting when you are targeted. Today, there is an abundance of monitoring tools meant to help brand owners monitor and care for their brand digitally.

A powerful and cost-efficient tool is Domain Monitoring. Domain Monitoring helps you protect your brand through the art of identifying threats and giving you the opportunity to act before too much damage is done.

With the Domain Monitoring service, you get information about where and when a domain registration occurs that contain your monitored name or word. The domain name monitoring can include identical names, misspellings, and phonetic variations, and it will provide you with information regarding where (and when) your monitored wordings are registered as domain names. It is most common to monitor your own brand, but the tool can also be used for monitoring your competition.

3 reasons why your brand needs domain monitoring

• Domain names are registered on a first-come-first-serve basis, aka, there is no preliminary examination like there is for brands and therefore it is free-for-all to register free domains around your brand. By using domain name monitoring for a tenor, you get an all-encompassing picture of how the wording is used for domain name registrations. A wording could be for example a company name, a product name, or a brand.

• Digital infringement and fraud are on the rise. Domain names are used as tools for various types of digital infringement and fraud, the purpose is often financial, but it could also be to spread propaganda. For example, email fraud, stealing traffic, selling pirate copies, phishing, or spreading fake news. Therefore, you want to know if another party registers domains containing your name. According to WIPO, the number of reported domain disputes have increased by 12% during 2018 – those are record-high levels.

• In the digital world, infringement takes little time. By monitoring your brand in domain registrations, you can act faster if the situation demands it. Hopefully before any damage is done.

Domain name monitoring is our most common monitoring service. If there is an interest, we can also offer additional monitoring in several fields, such as use of logos/images, use of brand in social media or at auction sites, as well as text content on websites.

Do you want to know if another party registers new domain names containing your brand or important names? Read more about Domain Monitoring service here.

If you suspect that you or your company have been victim of fraud, or if you want our experts to develop a proactive strategy for preventive purposes, do not hesitate to contact us at hello@dotkeeper.com, or call us at +46 40 – 613 09 00.

Read Part 1: Domain names Pawns in Digital Fraud here!