The first week of every month, we have scab removal day where myself and two others scour the internet looking for drop shippers, IP thieves, and other marketplace scabs.
I cannot express enough the necessity for brand and rights owners to actively combat those who would steal your images, brand and sell counterfeits.
Last week we did a test buy of a eBay product and received a knock off using a cheaper variation of our product.
Stay vigilant my friends, and share what tools and experience you have with IP theft.
One approach that I’ve seen that works well is kind of like a funnel.
First, you message a stock message to everybody you want to get rid of.
Then in a couple days you send another message to the remainder.
Then in a couple more days you start looking closer at the ones who are left and then determine the best course of action. Maybe you start off with a copyright claim, if they appeal that and stay on the listing, then move on to doing a test buy and filing a counterfeit complaint.
You go from low effort actions to high effort actions, so that if a seller drops off from a low effort action you can minimize the time spent in dealing with them.
Checked out that store; man, what a mess. Too bad that the average consumer isn’t well enough informed to know that you probably don’t want to buy a set of expensive knives from someone selling rugs and truck cranes.
Hopefully you’re not the only one reporting them.
I am always perplexed when I see folks that are ROs espouse a conviction that “ANY sale is a good sale,” as it seems obvious to this particular dunderhead that that’s a pretty short-sighted viewpoint to take when there’s a vested interest in protecting Brand Integrity.
VeRO & Project Zero alike have been very good to us, but in my experience there’s no substitute for having competent & experienced Members At The Bar @ one’s beck and call.
In our experience, the pound or ton of prevention makes curing the disease SO much easier. Every word and logo is trademarked, every picture copyrighted at the onset, so our claims are fairly bulletproof when submitted.
Stupid thieves are too lazy to even change the data in the descriptors. Last year we entered some random number/letter combo into one of the product detail page for model number. Now we get the low hanging fruit by just searching for that online because they use bots to copy the info and do not know the product enough to know what is relevant.
