Pelican Point Outfitters (fictional example) · July 2026 · 31 daily sweeps · 8 brand terms · Google, Bing/DuckDuckGo, Amazon, Walmart · US national + Wilmington + Charleston
Nine advertisers appeared on your brand terms in July; six of them were there in June and three are new. One of the new ones put your registered mark in its ad headline and called itself an authorized dealer — that was escalated to you the same morning, you filed the search engine's trademark complaint on 14 July with our wording, and the ad text changed on 22 July. Two of the nine are resellers you told us about, doing nothing wrong. Nothing else needed a decision, and we did not send you an email on the 24 days when nothing changed.
Written first, in plain English, because the table below is the evidence and this is the point.
| Advertiser | Surface | First seen | Last seen | Classification | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| coastalgearoutlet.example | Bing / DDG · slot 1 | 12 Jul | 31 Jul | Your mark in the ad headline · “authorized dealer” claim · not on your reseller list | Escalated · you filed 14 Jul · ad text changed 22 Jul |
| outdoorsupply.example | Google · slot 2 | 3 Jul | 31 Jul | Bidding on the keyword only · no mark in the ad | Logged · not restrictable · a bidding decision |
| Marsh & Tide Co. | Amazon · sponsored products | 18 Jun | 31 Jul | Listed reseller · genuine product · no affiliation claim | Policy-compliant · no action |
| Harbor Supply | Walmart · sponsored | 2 May | 31 Jul | Listed reseller · genuine product | Policy-compliant · no action |
| A gear-comparison site | Google · slot 3 | 22 Jul | 31 Jul | Informational landing page · a stated policy carve-out | Watch only |
| A regional competitor | Google · slot 1–2 | 9 Apr | 31 Jul | Keyword only · ad copy is their own brand | Logged · raising your brand-term cost, not a filing |
| Storefront #0388 (Amazon) | Amazon · sponsored products | 26 May | 31 Jul | Unknown storefront · genuine product per listing · no affiliation claim | Logged · first-sale — nothing to file unless the unit differs |
| packsandwaders.example | Bing / DDG · slot 2 | 14 May | 17 Jul | Keyword only | Left · not seen 14 days |
| An affiliate coupon site | Google · slot 4 | 30 Jun | 11 Jul | Coupon page · used your name descriptively | Left · not seen 20 days |
Two of the nine are your own resellers behaving; four are keyword-only, which no search engine restricts; one is a policy carve-out; two left. Exactly one needed a decision. A rollup that only ever found villains would be a sales document, not a monitoring one.
12 Jul, 06:52 sweep: first appearance, Bing/DDG top slot on “pelican point outfitters.” Headline: Pelican Point Outfitters Gear — Up To 40% Off. Description claims “authorized dealer pricing.” Full-page capture, ad text, final URL and timestamp filed as evidence entry #0417. Verified by a person by 07:10; alert to you at 07:14 under your reseller rule.
Which door: a registered trademark in the ad text from an advertiser who is not an authorized reseller is the case a search engine's trademark policy restricts — on the trademark owner's complaint, against that advertiser by URL. Bidding on the keyword alone would not have been actionable, and the alert said so.
Who acted: you. You confirmed on 13 Jul they are not a reseller. You submitted the search engine's trademark form on 14 Jul, in your name, with the wording below pasted in and the evidence attached. We did not contact the platform and did not sign anything.
What happened: the ad headline changed on 22 Jul to drop your mark; the description dropped the dealer claim. The advertiser is still bidding on the keyword — which is legal — and is now logged as keyword-only. Eight days from filing to change; we don't control that timing and won't quote you one.
Owner: you · filed 14 Jul · resolved 22 Jul · evidence #0417–#0431Four advertisers are bidding on your name without using it in their ad. Google's own trademarks policy says it will not restrict trademarks used as keywords, so there is no form to fill. The honest lever is economic: they raise your brand-term cost, and a small defensive campaign that runs only while they are present usually costs less than the clicks they intercept. That is a paid media conversation, and this log is the trigger for it.
It is selling what appears to be your genuine product and makes no affiliation claim. If they bought it legitimately, reselling it is legal, and no monitoring service changes that. What would change it is evidence the unit is materially different — expired, repackaged, no warranty — and that would need a test purchase, which you would make. We logged it and will flag it if the listing starts claiming to be you.
You mentioned a stale directory listing outranking you. It is real, and it is not an ad, so this service does not see it and did not report on it. We'd rather say so than let the rollup imply coverage it doesn't have.
Eight terms, four surfaces, national plus two metros, daily. Reply with any product name or misspelling you'd like added; volume is the only thing that changes the fee, and we'll say so before it does. Your allowlist has 3 entries and your reseller list has 4 — tell us when either changes, because that is what turns an alert into a non-event.
This document and the full evidence log — every sweep, every capture, first-seen and last-seen dates per advertiser — export with you at any time, including if you leave, at no charge. There is no version that stays on our side. On its own the service is month-to-month; inside a bundle where the setup fee was waived, that bundle carries a 12-month initial term with the setup amortised across it, and leaving early invoices only the unamortised balance. Nothing here has been held back to make you call, and nothing has been filed in your name by anyone but you.
Every monthly rollup takes this shape, written by whoever reviewed the month's alerts. Related: a sample paid-media scorecard and a sample monthly report. Sources referred to above: Google Ads Trademarks policy; 17 U.S.C. §512; USPTO “Why register your trademark?” — all retrieved August 2026. Not legal advice.
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