Product Counterfeiting: Prevent It from Impacting Your Brand

Counterfeit products not only steal your profits but also tarnish your reputation, destroying customer trust and potentially leading to legal consequences. For example, in 2023 alone, Brazil lost R$ 410 billion due to this criminal practice, with 35% of counterfeit sales occurring online. These data come from the Brazilian Association for the Fight Against Counterfeiting.

Due to such a high negative impact, it is natural for brands to seek strategic and effective ways to minimize the influence of these counterfeits. But how, exactly, can this be done?

Join Branddi, a specialist in combating brand violations, to understand how to protect your business!

What is Product Counterfeiting?

Product counterfeiting refers to the illegal copying of original items, made with the intent to pass off as authentic. These counterfeit products can range from imperfect replicas to near-indistinguishable imitations of original products, produced and sold by well-known companies. In short, counterfeiting is an illegal practice that violates intellectual property rights and harms both consumers and legitimate businesses.

Why are These Counterfeits Made?

Product counterfeiting is driven by several factors, the main one being quick and easy profit. By copying products from renowned brands, counterfeiters seek to take advantage of the reputation and trust those brands have already built in the market. However, that’s not all! Other reasons include:

• Mimicking Credibility: By passing off as an original product, counterfeits aim to garner the same credibility and consumer trust, allowing them to sell at lower prices and gain more attraction.
• Avoiding Production Costs: Counterfeiters often use lower-quality materials and cheaper production processes, significantly reducing their costs and increasing their profit margins.
• Difficulty in Traceability: Counterfeit production and distribution occur in underground networks, making it difficult for authorities to identify and combat them.

Top Counterfeit Products in Brazil

Brazil is one of the most affected countries by product counterfeiting, with several sectors hit by this practice. In fact, the country ranks fifth among the biggest consumers of piracy. But do you know which products are the most counterfeited in the country? Keep reading to learn about the four most counterfeited products!

Medications

Counterfeiting of medicines is a serious issue, as it puts people's health and lives at risk. Among the most counterfeited drugs are hormones, as they are highly sought after in the parallel market and have a high market value.

Clothing

The fashion industry is one of the most affected by counterfeiting, with major brands losing billions of reais annually. In 2022 alone, the losses amounted to R$ 84 billion. Why does this happen? Counterfeit clothing is mass-produced and sold in various channels, from street markets to online stores. As a result, counterfeit clothing harms the textile industry, generates unfair competition, and weakens the economy as a whole.

Footwear

Similar to clothing, footwear is also widely counterfeited. Famous sneaker and shoe brands are constantly copied, with low-quality products being sold at much lower prices. Besides damaging companies, counterfeit footwear harms consumers who purchase products that do not offer the same durability and comfort as the originals.

Electronics

Counterfeit electronics are an increasing problem, with various products such as phones, tablets, cameras, and accessories being copied. Counterfeit electronics usually contain low-quality components, which can cause malfunctions, overheating, and even explosions.

How Do Counterfeits Impact Your Brand?

Product counterfeiting not only affects a company’s revenue but also has significant impacts on its reputation and credibility. Although the financial losses caused by piracy are substantial, when we consider the bigger picture, the consequences are even more alarming.

Counterfeiting leads to consumer frustration when they do not receive the expected quality from the brand. This often causes buyers to express their complaints on review sites, which not only results in revenue loss but also legal actions.

This is exactly where Branddi plays a crucial role: we identify, flag, and actively combat ads and profiles that promote counterfeit products, reducing the time and resources invested in the legal protection of your brand.

Keep reading to understand how to protect your business from product counterfeiting!

Brand Dilution

Many know that the presence of counterfeit products in the market creates widespread confusion among consumers, who often cannot distinguish the original from the fake. What many don’t understand is that this uncertainty can lead to the devaluation of the brand as a whole. In other words, associating the brand with low-quality products and illegal practices can tarnish its reputation, making it less desirable to consumers.

As a result, it erodes the brand’s perception of exclusivity and superiority, making it more common and less attractive.

Revenue Theft

The sale of counterfeit products represents a significant loss of revenue for businesses, directly impacting their financial results. This is because the presence of these replicas in the market can devalue the original product, pushing prices down and reducing the profit margin of legitimate companies.

Unsatisfied Consumers and Increased Complaints

Consumers who purchase counterfeit products often have a negative experience due to poor quality, lack of durability, and other issues. However, that’s not all. Consumer dissatisfaction can lead to an increase in complaints, damaging the relationship between the brand and its customers and making it more difficult to build customer loyalty.

How to Protect Your Brand from Counterfeiting in Four Steps

Brand protection against counterfeiting requires a multifaceted approach, involving various actions and strategies. Some of the key measures you can adopt include:

Step One: Register Your Trademark

Registering your trademark grants the company exclusive rights to use the brand and prevents others from using it without authorization. For this reason, trademark registration is crucial to take legal actions against infringers and protect the brand from misuse. However, it is not everything: remember that this is just the first step in protecting your brand, and it alone does not guarantee brand security.

Create Transparency for Your Product and Communication

Provide clear and detailed information about your products, including materials, manufacturing processes, and technical characteristics. Additionally, establish direct communication channels with consumers, such as an official website, social media accounts, and an efficient customer service system. This creates unity in your image, allowing the public to more easily identify suspicious activities.

Leverage Technology

Technology enables much easier and more effective actions. Therefore, use online monitoring tools to identify and track the sale of counterfeit products on marketplaces, social media, and other digital channels.

And this is where Branddi comes in. Learn more about what we can do for your brand!

Rely on Branddi to Eliminate Product Counterfeiting

Branddi combines cutting-edge technology, human expertise, and artificial intelligence to scour the internet for ads containing counterfeit products of your brand.

We conduct active monitoring of domains, ads, and profiles on social media, scanning over two thousand existing TLDs. Once these occurrences are identified, our team sends extrajudicial notifications to registrars, servers, hosting systems, browsers, and advertising platforms.

This is how we achieve impressive results such as:

• 80% reduction in complaints
• 99% success rate in takedowns

Get in touch and understand how Branddi can protect your brand!