A friend of my daughter is a talented artist who used Instagram to sell many of his designs. He had over 7000 followers and each time he released a new series, it would sell out quickly. His account was deleted by Instagram and he had to start over with a new account. He now has 100 followers. Here’s what happened.
In one of his art series, he used the design and color scheme of a well known brand’s product. He thought he was OK because his designs were not knock-offs of the actual product. He was wrong. The company sent him a cease and desist letter and complained to Instagram. Even after the artist removed the offending designs, the brand continued to complain to Instagram who finally deleted his account. There are two big things you can take away from this artist’s experience.
Take Away #1
First, never use someone else’s copyrighted or trademarked intellectual property because you think you’re too small to be noticed. I have cautioned clients who wanted to include a favorite song lyric, poem, or an image they found on the web in their book. One client wanted to include an entire newspaper article and thought it was OK because the article was about her.
No, No, and No. You can use those things in your book under certain circumstances but in every case, you need to seek permission from the owner of the property. Some property owners make it easy by providing directions on their website. For others, you may have to go through a third party.
Large brands have an entire team of people who scour the web looking for intellectual property violations so don’t think you’re too small for them to pay attention. After all, they have spent years building their brand and want to preserve its integrity.
Take Away #2
The second takeaway is a reminder that you don’t own the followers you have on social media platforms. This is one of my hot buttons and I take every opportunity to get on my soapbox about it. Social media platforms own those followers and provide you access to them through the app. If you violate their rules of service, your account can be deleted and you will lose access to those followers as well as the content you’ve posted on the site.
Think about my daughter’s friend. He not only has to start from scratch and build his list up again, he will have to create new images and posts as well. That’s no small task. For this reason, I recommend you create an email list and encourage your social media fans to join it. You control that list and even if your social media account is deleted, you still have access to them. This approach will require extra work to first get people to sign up and regular communications to keep them on the list, but it’s well worth the effort.
