Business owners pressed for time and money can still implement serious plans of action to protect their intellectual property without breaking the bank or ignoring revenue goals.
Make a deliberate choice to protecting your most valuable assets – your intellectual capital. It is well worth the effort. Whether it’s how your employees conduct business, which clients you do the most business with, how you service those clients, or how you communicate with clients and employees, intellectual property is wrapped around all of it. Three easy tips incorporated into your daily business can lead to long-term success.
Tip #1: Your “know how” needs confidential treatment. Your client list and how your clients are serviced constitute your “know how” or more commonly “trade secrets” that must be kept confidential – once they become public any protections you may have had will evaporate. The use of non-disclosure agreements with third parties is essential – as well as ensuring your employees understand this fundamental concept. Using well-written contracts with clients will also help ensure your know how is protected.
Tip #2: Your brand, sales and marketing brochures, and training materials should be trademark and copyright protected. Even a small company with no employees can have a robust brand built over many years – and found predominantly on the company’s sales and marketing materials. All that is necessary for local common law protection is that it be in use to identify specific services or products. To obtain nationwide protection and added damages for infringement, the mark should seek federal registration using the USPTO.Gov website. Similarly, the product brochures created from scratch are copyright protected as soon as they were created but have enhanced protection when registered at Copyright.Gov.
As you review the content and systems powering your business — everything from the company names to the use of training materials — you will quickly appreciate how much value goes unguarded. Consulting a legal expert or learning how to protect your trademarks and copyrights may not be quick or glamorous, but it will give you something longstanding: ownership of an intangible asset, leverage, and peace of mind.
Tip #3: Plan for the sale of your business by incorporating these best practices. According to the SBA, more than half of the nation’s small-business owners are over the age of 50, and approximately 21% of the US population were born before 1964. And, according to one study, baby boomers owned about 51% of the privately held businesses in the United States, which is about 3 million businesses valued at $10 trillion dollars. Unfortunately, founders typically defer addressing the fact that they will one day be too old and tired to manage a successful business.
When no one in the family wants to take over your business there are only two options, close shop or sell to a willing buyer. One metric used in valuing businesses is tied to the company’s ability to scale based on its protected intellectual property assets. In other words, sustainable growth is not always about making more — it’s also about being able to protect what you’ve already built. After deploying the right practices, support system, and mindset, a successful entrepreneur can go from vulnerable to vigilant — and nurture a business that’s built for selling.
