Protecting Your Home Based Business

A Home Business Article Contributed by Jenni Mckinney

Protecting Your Home Based Business: Patents

If you are one of the millions of Americans out there who own and operate a home based business with a unique product or service, you will want to take as many precautions as you possibly can in order to protect your goods or services from being stolen. Your first step may be to consider a patent. What is a patent?

It is a certificate granted by the government that states that an invention that your home based business has created cannot be modified or duplicated by any other company for a set period of time. This is one of the most useful and binding types of recognition the government bestows, and for this reason it is also a complicated and expensive procedure. You will most definitely need the services of a patent attorney, first of all, and that will be your first big expense.

Second, to apply initially for the "patent pending" certificate requires an up front cost of between $5000 and $15000, depending on your product. Finally, you must pay an annual fee as well as an additional fee if you choose to renew your patent for another set period of time.

Protecting Your Home Based Business: Trademarks

If you have created a logo and a byline, you will want to look into getting a trademark to protect those things. Abbreviated TM next to your company name, a trademark protects your business from being duplicated. This means a competitor cannot name his business the same name as yours and cannot have the same logo, or even a similar logo.

An example of trademark protection occurred when the football team, the Jacksonville Jaguars, decided to have as their logo a jaguar that looked a lot like the logo of the famous car manufacturer, Jaguar. The car manufacturer sued the football team and won, and the government forced the football team to stop using their current logo and to come up with something else, something that could be considered uniquely theirs.

Typically, before you create the name and logo for your home based business, you will want to hire a trademark agency to do a thorough search of the industry to make sure you are not impinging on some other company's trademark protection. This service will typically cost between $75 to $2000, depending on the nature of the search.

Protecting Your Home Based Business: Copyrights

If your home based business will include original artwork or marketing materials, such as a web site, brochures, and sales manuals, you may want to register for a copyright to protect your materials from being used by others. Typically, copyrights are used for printed material, specifically for books, magazines, articles, speeches, and television broadcasts.

Protecting Your Home Based Business: Licenses

If your home based business has created proprietary software, you will want to require that anyone outside of your company who uses it must have a license. This allows you to profit on a continual basis (usually annually), rather than from just a one-time sale. To find out more about licensing, you should contact an attorney whose specialty is intellectual property law.