Click revenues generated by bidding on brand names should go to the brand owner

Search engine marketers know that bidding on strong brand names is a great method to generate sales.

E-mail marketers know that a brand name in the e-mail subject line usually increases the open rate.

Online marketers know the power of branding in purchasing processes. Customers feel safer when shopping on well-known websites and the conversion rate on well-known sites will be higher(if all else is equal).

Brands are important. Large and small companies around the world are struggling to protect their brand names in all marketing channels.

Among the strictest are Nokia and Apple. If you are a mobile phone dealership and you would like to promote your product using Google Adwords, you have to ask Nokia and Apple for explicit permission to bid on terms that they own, i.e. Nokia and Apple iPod.

Instead of refusing advertisers to advertise on brand terms, Google should offer the brand owners a chance to make money when people bid on their brand names.

This is how it would work:
- An advertiser bids on the term NOKIA.
- An automatic e-mail is sent to NOKIA requesting permission to advertise.
- Click revenues generated by bidding on brand names should go to the brand owner
- Google should be paid a transaction fee for enabling the brand name rent

If this implemented the brand owner will always be able to spend more on protecting their brand in Google. The brand owner could pay more to affiliates and afford a higher cost per click. Google would avoid expensive lawsuits while enabling brand owners to spend more on keyword advertising.

Win - Win - Win.

Interesting statistics:
Hitwise Research shows that Internet users are increasingly searching by brand - 75 of the top 100 search terms across all categories in February 2006 contained brand names, an increase of 17% versus February 2005.