Prominent consumer survey companies like Keegan & Donato Consulting can help you strengthen your case in Jacksonville with independent consumer-based survey research solutions.
Consumer confusion, dilution, false designation of origin, trade dress infringement, false advertising, and other Lanham Act issues can harm a product’s reputation and sales, inflicting short- and long-term damage. A consumer survey can provide empirical evidence to show that an alleged trademark infringement is having a real world impact on consumers.
Keegan & Donato Consulting provides a complete suite of services, including consulting on litigation strategy for both plaintiff and defendant clients, consumer research studies, expert reports, testimony in trademark/trade-dress litigation, testimony at deposition and/or trial, and rebuttal of opposing parties’ surveys when applicable.
Why Hiring a Survey Expert is Crucial
Good survey evidence about consumer perceptions can be powerful. However, consumer surveys typically are not accepted without challenge. Courts demand accurate, real-world data, and design flaws can result in partial or full exclusion of survey evidence from a case.
For example, in Pinterest, Inc. v. Pintrips, Inc., Case No. 13-cv-04608-HSG, Dist. Court, N.D. California (2015), the plaintiff introduced two surveys to support its claim of consumer confusion over the defendant’s use of the word “pin.” The Court strongly disagreed, and determined that “fatal defects in the design of each survey render their results meaningless to the resolution of this lawsuit.”
The court assigned no weight to the results of one survey because it determined that issues with the survey design and interpretation compromised its results. The “survey design does not permit the Court to draw any inference about whether… any survey respondents would have associated the Pintrips website with Pinterest.”
The findings of the other survey were rejected on the basis that it was not “conducted with a pool of respondents drawn from the general public, and, accordingly, the Court cannot consider its findings as evidence that the general public was familiar with Pinterest’s marks.”
How Keegan & Donato Consulting Can Help
At Keegan & Donato Consulting, we consider methodological design among the most crucial aspects of designing a consumer research study. Our education and decades of experience conducting and critiquing consumer survey research has provided us the tools and skills to design methodologically sound surveys following these (and other) established principles:
- Appropriate universe selection and sampling frame;
- Rigorous and valid survey design that is probative of the relevant issues in the case;
- Inclusion of representative, qualified respondents;
- Use of procedures to minimize potential biases in data collection;
- Use of objective, non-leading questions;
- Use of procedures to reduce guessing among respondents; and
- Full analysis and reporting of survey data.
Our firm provides services throughout the nation to attorneys practicing in federal and state courts, before arbitration panels, the TTAB, the NAD, and other specialty venues. We have been engaged by top firms such as Arnold Porter LLP in San Francisco, Day Pitney LLP in New York City, Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP in Boston, and Schepisi & McLaughlin, PA in New Jersey.
When you are assessing consumer survey companies for your IP case in Jacksonville, consider a highly qualified survey consultancy firm like Keegan & Donato Consulting that offers vast experience in the full spectrum of trademark infringement matters. Get in touch with us today at (914) 967-9421 to learn more.