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Lastminute attacks Google over trademark rights
Google came under fire yesterday from lastminute.com following its decision to take away trademark rights in the UK.
The radical change, which will see the search engine no longer blocking advertisers from bidding on any branded keywords, could mean prices go through the roof for major UK brands.
Lastminute chief executive officer Ian McCaig told the search engine’s managing director of advertising and marketing Rob Torres at London’s Travolution Summit: “There is a lot of disappointment, hurt and pain around how this has been done.”
He added: “We have spent ten years building up the brand and it is my assessment that this is going to cost me a seven figure sum in euros a year.”
Torres responded that Google had made the decision based around the view that its aim was to improve the user experience.
He said: “A lot of suppliers felt that we were trying to hurt them when we did this in the US. But we have to say ‘what is our mission?’. Well we are in the business because of our users. We are continually trying to improve the user experience for them.
“That said, the new decision is really about user choice and making sure that everyone is represented. What we have found is that there has been very little concern by suppliers in the US.
“The Google model is not a pay to play one. If you are the brand owner, your relevance will come up as higher than someone else’s so you are going to come higher up on Google’s auction process.”
He added: “Yes, there will be fly-by-night operators but they will pay so much for clicks that they wont be able to substantiate this in the long term – that has what we have seen in the US.”
*See linked Travolution Summit report and TravelMole’s e-Wire.
by:Dinah Hatch
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