Protect the Intellectual Property of Your Small Business

A Home Business Article Contributed by Donna m. Brown

Protect Your Small Business, Protect Your Ideas

Ideas are property and your small business should get a healthy start by recognizing what you already own. In order for a business to be successful, it is vital that its administration treat ideas as property. If you have a great idea and choose not to act on it now, chances are you will see someone else taking that idea to market with tremendous success. Don't blow your opportunity. Once someone turns your idea into money, it's too late for you to reinvent it.

Ideas are easy to come by, but inventions are a little more difficult. Developing these ideas is a giant step for your small business. Development of inventions takes time, money, effort, planning and knowledge. It takes real commitment to move your idea on to the invention stage. Even if you get your invention off to a good start, some luck will be involves in turning that invention into an innovation.

This process takes time and while you work at it, you should carefully consider protecting yourself with patents, copyrights and trademarks. These as well as your trade secrets are considered intellectual property and could be valuable alone. Protections that are legally in place can be counted among the tangible assets of your small business.

Pursue Protection for Your Small Business, but Don't Rely on it Alone

Many people and small business organizations have valuable intellectual property and don't know how to protect it. Even if you do take measures to protect your intellectual property remember, protection alone is not a guarantee of success.

Only you can decide if your idea or invention is valuable enough to pursue proper protection under the law. If you own a small business, decide if you will be operating at a risk if you don't seek protection. Even if you don't pursue legal rights, it's important to make sure you don't infringe on the protected rights of others in the course of operating your small business.

Study up on protection laws so that you can determine whether or not you are unconsciously guilty of violating them.

Trademarks, Patents, Copyright: What Does it All Mean for Your Small Business?

You and employees of your small business should become familiar with intellectual property protection terms. Here are a few to get you started:

A trademark is a name, symbol or other device identifying a product, officially registered and legally restricted to the use of the owner or manufacturer.

A copyright is the legal right granted to an author, composer, playwright, publisher or distributor to exclusive publication, production, sale, or distribution of a literary, musical, dramatic, or artistic work.

A patent is a grant made by a government that confers upon the creator of an invention the sole right to make, use, and sell that invention for a set period of time.

To determine the process you need to follow to protect your intellectual property, visit regulatory agency Websites on line. Search for tips and instructions on obtaining these protections using your favorite search engines. Carefully check and recheck information and don't give anyone money to protect your resources without checking with the government agencies that regulate the type of protection you seek.