11 Strategies to Protect Your Intellectual Property in Online Training
Editor's note: this article is for informational purposes only. Consult a licensed legal professional before relying solely on the information provided below.
Content. Content is the heart of any knowledge-based and educational-based enterprise. It showcases the world your expertise, gives your company a name and helps generate your business earnings. Naturally, it deserves protection.
However, how can you handle the protection of the intellectual property (IP) specifically in the light of the reality of the internet's "sharing economy"sharing economy"? When even Hollywood and their powerful lawyers, can't stop illicit downloads or file sharing, as well as piracy How can you ensure your IP safe as a course or content creator?
The realities of the internet:
Even with the latest technological advances, we can't fully protect our IP. If it goes online, it's at risk of getting stolen, copied or used by someone who haven't paid for it. That's a fact. If someone really wants to have it, they'll.
If you find that your IP is being employed for illegitimacy in threatening way, you have to take action in the situation. If someone uses your information, IP or name to steal money from of your business, you must call your legal professionals immediately.
While reacting appropriately to having your IP stolen great and well, setting safeguards is far better.
1. Create a Trademark
If you're really worried with the security of your IP, then it may be worth you considering getting an Trademark. This isn't a good option for all business, and it's costly too. However, I would recommend talking to an trademark attorney and asking their advice on what your options could be.
2. Print and mail your material to yourself
Simply print out your whole course, including the lessons plans, curriculum and content; then mail the course to yourself in a tracked and delivered, after which you never ever open it again. If you ever had someone copy your content , and they took it to court You have the current proof of the date your content was created and the length of time it's been available for. Simple, yet effective.
3. Time stamp your content
If you are sharing web-based content, remember the fact that if you're sharing it publically, it is proof that you published it at first! Every blog post has an 'published' date written in it. Every YouTube video, Facebook status updates, and live stream videos show the post's original date as well. If an identical piece of content comes out following the publication of your original the obvious question is who got it from who.
4. Display your face
5. Watermark your content
Make sure that your name, as well as your website's URL, or watermark are displayed in your training videos and documents. So, if the content has been shared illegally yet it has your logo or face, as well as the URL of your website, it's still you that receives the praise or credit from fans, as well as any business that might result from someone who has watched the content.
Here's an example the watermark that I've added to some of my YouTube channels:
6. Make it common knowledge
If you have a 'saying', an approach that you believe is yours, or a procedure you believe is yours, don't ask yourself what you could do to wrap it up and protect it. Instead, you should find ways to make it appear so massive and personal to you, so that regardless of the place and what it's being used for the world knows that you own it. Make it clear in every video, every blog, on your website and in your signature email, every interview you do and anywhere else you're get noticed. Make it undeniably yours, but allow it to belong to anyone who wants to associate themselves as part of it - after all, this is the way to build a tribe.
This is precisely how and that is the main reason why I invented ' Edupreneurs' and defined the term ' Edupreneurship'. I wanted to become an unquestionably leader in some thing, however I wanted to do it in a manner that was able to give away something that others to assume the identity of their own. An identity that they could call the their own, but which is always going to me as the person who was responsible for initiating it in the first place.
7. Be on the lookout for similar material
Keep an eye on your stuff. I use Google Alerts which is free Google tool that allows users to type in different keywords, including your name, as well as certain words and phrases that you frequently use. Once you've set it up, Google will email you every time those terms or words are published online - then you are able to check them out and see if you have been plagiarized, properly referenced in a proper manner, or an accident.
It is also possible to utilize plagiarism checkers to find out if your work has been copied elsewhere. There are lots out there however one can be found in Copyscape, where you could add the URL of the blog you have written, for example the post, and Copyscape will search the internet for similar content.
8. Do you have a Copyright Policy
You can create your own guidelines to guide and educate people on what's ok and what is not acceptable when it comes in relation to IP. Though this will not necessarily shield you from legal liability, this education can guide those who wish to refer to you in a fair manner on and in the right way. Make a clear list of what you consider acceptable in reference to you using your own content and sharing it with others or replicating it. Then, list the things that aren't. Give them some guidelines regarding the sorts of matters they'd need to ask your permission for and what they can do without having to ask to be granted written permission.
Finally, consider including an attribution symbol ((c)) or disclaimer with your content. Although it doesn't offer extra security, it could make others be cautious before reproducing it.
9. Create a course that is truly useful for only one person
10. If you hold it back and don't let it go, you're the culprit.
It's easy to slip into defensive mode, to protect our intellectual assets and put it into a secret knowledge vault where it's 'safe from the people who pinch'. However, don't hide the entirety of your knowledge, and stop all of your millions of potential clients from learning itjust to ensure that only a few customers don't understand it. There's a certain amount of madness within this.
We can become so obsessed in defending ourselves that we forget about those that we're trying assist by putting together classes in the first place and then'stealing' their opportunity to learn. What's more troubling? Thousands of people having their lives altered through your work, with only some people getting their hands on it "on the dark market' or nobody ever getting your aid in any way?
11. Remember, nobody can ever be your
The best thing about being human is the fact that there are so many different ways to be. Our words can be copied by others and our writing style, as well as our thoughts and even our ideas, but they can never become us.
People don't spend money on stuff, they buy people. Because people like people. How we talk and how we appear, the tone of our voice, the way we move our bodies, who we remind people of, the way we make them feel in our non-verbal communication and much more of the subconscious subtleties that are really behind any purchase we make are all factors that could be never taken away from us regardless of the effort of someone trying.
I'm very conscious of the fact that, despite my growing competition daily as well as the number of other people that are now out there looking to take over my customers with my content, they will never be me which means they will never become an issue.
You is the most prominent mark of your IP therefore, while we must keep half an eye open, don't let the fear of your IP being duplicated be the reason for your impact on the lives of others.
Sarah Cordiner is an education expert, author, and speaker, trainer, award winning creator of online courses and the CEO of Main Training. After 11 years of business in the field of education and over 5,000 students in more than 121 countries, Sarah encapsulates a mesmerizing marriage of business and education. She is the internationally recognized leader of EDUpreneur in "profitably informing your audience'.