Ever wondered if trademarking for therapists is really necessary? In this episode of The Traveling Therapist Podcast, I chat with Sarah Waldbuesser, a lawyer who helps online business owners protect their brands and build legal foundations. Sarah breaks down exactly why trademarking your podcast, course, retreat, or coaching business might be more important than you think, especially if you’d get that gut-punch feeling from a cease and desist letter!
Whether you’re just starting to branch out or you’ve got a whole ecosystem of offers, Sarah shares what you need to know to stay protected while growing your brand.
In This Episode, We Explore…
Connect with Sarah:
Website - https://twistlaw.co/ | https://destinationlegal.com/ | https://thelegitcoach.com/
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/the.legitcoach/ | https://www.instagram.com/sarahwaldbuesser
Connect with me:
Instagram: @thetravelingtherapist_kym
The Traveling Therapist Facebook Group: www.facebook.com/groups/onlineandtraveling/
Signup to learn more about life as a Traveling Therapist: https://www.portablepracticemethod.com/free-training
Revolutionize Your Private Practice with AI Course: www.kymtolson.kartra.com/page/ai
Bill Like A Boss Insurance Billing Community: www.kymtolson.kartra.com/page/blab
Subscribe to the Podcast:
Apple iTunes | Spotify | Google Podcast | Stitcher | Amazon | Castbox
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Transcript:
[00:00:00] Kym: Hey everybody. Welcome back to another episode of The Traveling Therapist podcast. We've got a really cool guest today. You guys super excited to introduce you to Sarah Waldbuesser. Sarah's not a, therapist, but she has got some really cool ties to the therapist community.
[00:00:15] I wanna really dive in and talk to you about first you're traveling, but also everything that you do and what you can offer to the traveling therapist. Because we are a community of entrepreneurial therapists, we're always outside of the box anyway, whether our traveling lifestyle and many, many, many of us are entrepreneurial and
[00:00:34] Sarah, why don't you introduce yourself, tell us what you do and then we can explain how it ties into what these entrepreneurial therapists are doing in their lives.
[00:00:42] Sarah: Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for having me. You know, I'm a huge traveler, so anything with the word traveling traveler, sign me up. So excited to chat. So I'm an attorney, as you said. I have a couple different businesses which we can dive more into, but I've been doing this for over 10 years and you know, like I'm sure so many of the listeners, I am also untraditional.
[00:01:03] I never fit into the box of being a lawyer and knew that very quickly when I was an associate, a law firm in Washington dc I was just, within six months, I was like, this is not for me. So, it took me a bit to get here on this path, but we're here now and we're happy about that. And, while I didn't love being a lawyer in a law firm, I love being a lawyer for, you know, what turns out to be mostly women, online business owners and coaches.
[00:01:30] And so I really help them in a number of ways. One is through helping them own their brands through a registered trademark at my law firm. And then I also have a digital contract shop with do it yourself, downloadable, customizable contracts for coaches, health coaches, course creators, membership site owners, you know, retreat hosts if you're running a business online.
[00:01:54] You know, I know a lot of therapists are, creeping into doing coaching and hosting retreats all over the world and, we provide all of the contracts and the legal foundations that they need to be successful and to know that their businesses are legally protected.
[00:02:07] Kym: Oh my gosh. We need you so much. I need you. I've got all these income streams that I'll be the first to admit. I've been really bad about like contracts and, it's just being a therapist, it's just like, I'm not into like details like that, you know, just the business details, you know, which is hard to admit, but very true.
[00:02:25] So I would love if you could like, touch on the trademark part of your brand? Like, do you think therapists need to trademark their practices or is this more like entrepreneurial coaches that have got like other businesses, like I've got the traveling therapist. I did get that trademarked, but it took me a while.
[00:02:41] I was like, should I, shouldn't I? And being entrepreneurial and multi-passion, I'm always launching like these new things and I always have that question like, should I trademark it? Should I just do it? So I would love to just unpack that a little bit for the therapists listening that are, are delving into this other world, like where do you go with that and how do you know when to trademark something?
[00:02:59] Sarah: Yeah, that's such a good question. So owning a trademark is really awesome, right? I'm sure you feel it now that you're a trademark owner, to know that you own your brand, you own the name of your podcast, nobody else in your space can have this name. You're not gonna get a cease and desist letter tomorrow saying you have to rebrand your podcast, right?
[00:03:19] So there's a couple reasons to think about it. Because it is powerful. A trademark is a business asset that can be bought, it can be sold, and it's really offensive and defensive because not only do you know that you own it, you know that nobody else can. And so, you know, as you're building, whether it's a therapy practice, whether it's a coaching business, if you are out there selling your services, which you know, I know sometimes therapists, doctors, healers don't like to think of themselves as selling your services, but you are, you know, and we need you to, right?
[00:03:50] We need you to do that. If you're putting marketing dollars, branding, design, work behind a name, you wanna think about owning it. So, you know, that's really the question is are you investing time, energy, and money? Whether it's the name of your practice, whether you're putting on a course, a podcast, I know a lot of therapists work behind their name, individually, so you wouldn't necessarily need to trademark that.
[00:04:15] But if you are expanding out and using another name, then it might be something to think about. So it's really actually more of an emotional decision than logical. Like I can give you all the logical reasons, right? you know, It's smart, it's strategic. It's powerful. It gives you confidence, but really it comes down to something I have coined the gut punch test.
[00:04:35] So if you are thinking about your business name, your service, your podcast, your product, if you're thinking about that name in your mind, how would you feel if tomorrow you got a cease and desist letter in your email saying you had 10 days to rebrand.
[00:04:53] If you get a gut punch, it's time to trademark. It's time for you to own that brand name. If you didn't, if you're like, I was thinking about changing it anyway. It's not, but if you get the gut punch, if you got a little stick to your stomach, just then thinking about it, that means it's time.
[00:05:08] Kym: That's really good advice because as soon as you said that, I'm like, oh my gosh. 'cause I've got all these other things hanging out right now. I'm like, I really probably should trademark this. so what can you trademark? Like, is it a business name you can't trademark, like phrases? Can you or can't you?
[00:05:21] you, like, 'cause
[00:05:22] Sarah: Yes, you can think about like just do it, right? That's a phrase, Nike, you know, so you can trademark anything that is tied to something that you're selling or marketing. So you can trademark a business name, a course name. Your coaching package, a retreat name, a podcast a membership site, an app if you're selling notebooks or water bottles or t-shirts consulting services or ad services. Basically anything that you're marketing or selling, you can trademark.
[00:05:56] Kym: Okay. Yeah, How does somebody do that? Like they just reach out to you and say, Hey, I've got this name of my business, do you have to like establish a business entity first before you could do that?
[00:06:05] Sarah: No you don't. So you can trademark as an individual or you can trademark as a business, either one. And if you start out as an individual later, you can move it to your business. You can trademark even before you're selling anything. So you can actually reserve a trademark. It's called Intent to use. So one example is like Sarah Blakely with Sneex, like she filed the trademark a year and a half before she ever launched Sneex 'cause she wanted to make sure that it was protected.
[00:06:33] you know, there's a couple steps to take as you're naming your programs, courses, business, podcasts. First thing you wanna do is just Google it. Google the name, see who else is using it, see if they're in your industry. 'cause it really is about your specific industry.
[00:06:50] So for example, you can have, we have Dove Chocolate and we have Dove soap. Those are both registered trademarks, but they don't conflict because if I said I had the best piece of Dove after lunch, hopefully, you know, that I was not eating soap. Right? So, you know, there's 45 different classes of goods or services.
[00:07:09] So, you know, you're really thinking about who's within my class of goods or services. So you know, if you had Googled the Traveling Therapist podcast and there was something like similar in therapy, then that would've been a red flag.
[00:07:22] and so Google, you know, look on social media, see how the phrase or name is being used, and then you can go to uspto.gov, which is the United States Patent Trademark Office.
[00:07:33] They have a free search engine where you can see, pending and registered trademarks. If things look good and you're again invested in this brand, you're gonna start. Spending dollars behind it, then you wanna reach out to a trademark attorney, have a conversation, you know, what's it like to work with you?
[00:07:49] What are your packages? And you know, some things to look for. There are, are they a trademark attorney or are they a real estate attorney that has done a couple of trademarks, you know, wanna make sure that that is their expertise. And then look at their packages. So some trademark attorneys or trademark factories or LegalZoom will like. File and then they just leave you be. Right. so if there's any issue.
[00:08:11] Kym: That, yeah, that's what I did, LegalZoom, and it was like, it seemed like they just kept getting fees added on
[00:08:17] Sarah: Yeah,
[00:08:17] Kym: I didn't research this very well. Yeah.
[00:08:20] Sarah: So you know, you wanna know exactly what's included. Are there responses to any issues, office actions that come up? some will file and then add on fees as you go. Or you know, like for my firm, we're purely flat fee everything upfront. So, you wanna just research that a little bit and then go from there.
[00:08:39] Kym: And what if, I mean, this is a weird question, but like, what if you, like I've been using a name and you then you're like, oh, maybe I should Google that. And then you see somebody else's using it, but they haven't trademarked it either is that could, but they've been around longer maybe or something. Can you still come in and trademark?
[00:08:53] Sarah: you can, but there's a little but there, 'cause there's, you know, trademark law is based on first use in commerce. So technically if someone has been around longer, they might have what we call common law trademark rights.
[00:09:07] However, if they haven't registered yet and might not have plans to, then you can definitely go and file the registration and then even challenge them and say, Hey you can't use this anymore and then, at that point they have the opportunity to try to fight or not.
[00:09:23] But certainly at some point it's like a race to the trademark office. So I'm actually dealing with this right now with someone who, has a podcast and has a name. She's been using it for seven years and just found out that somebody else has been using it for six years and registered it five years ago. And so now she's in a pretty not great position of having to change after all these years because she waited so long to think about registering the trademark. So, you know, really the sooner the better. If you see someone out there using it and they don't have the R behind the name and you check it out and they haven't registered, that means, hey, like time to get to the trademark office.
[00:10:06] Kym: Wow, that's so interesting. So tell us about the other things that you do, because aside from trademarking, you've also got like a contract shop, I think you were sharing, and then, you know, you help coaches with these, like, I've got memberships, I've got courses, I don't have contracts in these , which is terrible.
[00:10:23] I do partnership deals, I've got contracts, I've kind of piecemealed together myself over the years, which is I do not recommend to anybody. So I'd love to just talk about like , what is that process like with you for somebody that maybe is just stepping into this and wants to do it the right way and not the way I did it.
[00:10:37] Sarah: Yeah, so, you know, building your legal foundation, legal is a toolbox that you build on as you grow. And, the sooner the better, but we, start where you're at, right? And so I always say the most important thing to think about, if you're, you know, a coach or offering courses or memberships, is to just make sure you have your basic contract in place.
[00:10:58] Whether that's one-on-one services, whether that's terms of purchase for a digital product, a course, a membership, having that in place and then as you grow, your legal needs will change. So if you have a website, you need to make sure to have a privacy policy and website terms and disclaimers.
[00:11:14] If you at some point are hosting a retreat, you need to have a retreat contract. If you have a partnership, you need to have a partnership contract. The rule of thumb is anytime you are paying somebody or being paid money. You need to have contracts or terms in place and you know, not everything has to be super complicated.
[00:11:33] So if you're doing one-on-one services, it's maybe a higher sale price, higher figure package. You might want signatures one-on-one signing, going back and forth. But if you're selling a membership or a course, just terms of purchase at the point of checkout, by clicking here, you agree to our terms of purchase and you're done.
[00:11:53] And so you know what we sell are these 'done for you' customizable contracts that basically guide you through exactly what to fill out your business name, are you a sole proprietor? Are you an LLC? What's the name of your course and your website? What's included? What's your refund policy? What's your payment policy? protecting your ip.
[00:12:12] And then for you guys, all of you therapists out there disclaimers, right? Like for courses for memberships, like none of this is professional medical, legal advice, right? You are, you know, this is especially important. I deal with a lot of registered dieticians or therapists working outside states, like when you're doing that, you're not necessarily working in your capacity as a therapist, even if you are one.
[00:12:35] Right? And so just making sure that's super clear. And so, you know, for someone just starting out, we have these great bundles that have all of your beginning contracts. You're one-on-one, everything for your website terms for group program. And so we try to make it really easy to just have everything there that you need to get started.
[00:12:54] Kym: Wow, that's so awesome. And where do they find your shop? We'll put it
[00:12:57] Sarah: Yeah. So all of, yeah, all of that is at destinationlegal.com. And then if you're a coach, you know, I actually have a new amazing, I'm really excited about program coming out just for coaches called The Legit Coach. We're gonna have a get legit bootcamp. And so we will, we'll put some of those details in the show notes as well. If you are a therapist that is also doing some coaching on the side.
[00:13:18] Kym: I love it. Get legit. So just to shift gears a little bit, right? 'cause you're a a female entrepreneur, you've got this amazing business, you've got kids, can you just tell everybody about your traveling life? I'd love to just like let everybody know that you're also nomadic like we are, so they can get to know you a little bit better.
[00:13:36] Sarah: Absolutely. And you know, I started, as a nomad. That was the reason, you know, I really wanted to start my own business and. I actually over, gosh, like 12 or 13 years ago now, I had been living in Washington, DC and I just wanted to travel. I just wanted to travel. And I had been kind of traveling for my job, but if you, if anyone knows, traveling for work is different than traveling for fun.
[00:14:01] So I started Googling, like, travel while you work, get paid to travel. And I came across these two guys that were running a podcast. And about an online business. And this was like 2012, right? What's an online business? And I started listening to them every day on my walk to work. And eventually they advertised that they were running a two week workshop in an island on the Philippines on how to start an online business.
[00:14:26] Kym: Oh my gosh.
[00:14:27] Sarah: I was sold, I quit my job, cashed in my 401k, hopped on a plane to the Philippines, and that was how my first business started. And have been, traveling and I, I would say at this point, semi nomadic. So I had about a year and a half to two years where I was full digital nomad throughout Asia and Europe and then settled back in the States. 'Cause you know, if you haven't done these episodes, dating as a nomad can be challenge and
[00:14:55] I was like, I need to find myself a husband. So I like went back to the States for a bit, found myself a husband had some kids but we've, I've always had the bug, right? We took our nine month old baby to Cuba, right?
[00:15:08] Like we're, we are adventurous spirits. So this past year, you know, our kids are still young enough, they were three and five that we were like, we really wanna just test this out. What is it like to travel with them? Do we potentially wanna live abroad? You know, I think all of those kinds of questions that those of us that love to travel have, and we decided we would take 2024 and just do that. So we spent three months in Italy with a program called Boundless Life, which
[00:15:35] Kym: Oh yeah, I've heard about
[00:15:36] Sarah: heard of it. Yeah. It's, it's an amazing program for digital nomad families with kids that want some support in terms of schooling and housing and coworking, and that was really awesome. We did that in Italy and then we were on our own.
[00:15:51] Then we spent the next four four and a half months in Thailand and then followed that up with about four and a half, five months in Mexico.
[00:15:59] Kym: Wow. Now, was Thailand also a boundless life, or was Boundless life?
[00:16:03] Sarah: No. Yeah, yeah. Boundless life was just Italy, you know, Thailand. I had lived in for six months as a digital nomad. I'd been back numerous times. So Thailand is one of those places that feels really second nature to me. I love being there. And so, you know, that was really fun.
[00:16:19] Kym: That's really cool. So boundless life, I don't know. For some reason I thought that was like for school age kids, but I guess it's for all age kids is
[00:16:26] Sarah: Yeah, so like 1-year-old, they have like 1-year-old two up to I think 12 or
[00:16:33] Kym: That's amazing. Okay.
[00:16:36] Sarah: them up in like Montessori style schooling And they find you an apartment if you want. They, there's a coworking space. There's community, and now, you know, they have spots in Portugal and in Spain, Montenegro, Bali, Uruguay.
[00:16:52] And now there's people that just travel with Boundless for the whole year. They're just like, I'm gonna go to Greece, Italy, and Montenegro.
[00:17:01] Kym: Oh my gosh.
[00:17:01] Sarah: with like the Visa issues, but
[00:17:03] Kym: That is the coolest thing. If I had
[00:17:05] Sarah: it is.
[00:17:06] Kym: be all over that.
[00:17:07] Sarah: It's a really cool startup, you know? It is, it comes at a cost, like there everything is in Euros and but it is, it was great for us because even as a, well, you know, I consider myself a very well seasoned traveler.
[00:17:20] Doing it with kids was intimidating to me. And I was just like, how are we gonna do this? So I feel like Boundless life kind of helped us step out into that with some support. And then we were fine the rest of the time.
[00:17:33] Kym: Yeah. That's so interesting. And then in Thailand, were y'all like still working and somehow having childcare or did y'all like flip back and forth? I always wonder how couples do that with their kids and working and, and
[00:17:45] Sarah: so we always had them in some sort of preschool daycare. So, we found great ones in Thailand. You know, we weren't concerned. They were young enough. We're not concerned about academics. We just want them to be safe and happy and having fun. And so, the Thai women are nothing if not amazing and caring.
[00:18:05] And so we found, kind of international preschools where they were with kids from Europe and from China and US and Canada and Australia, and had a great time. And then in Mexico, similar, we found an international school where they were there for most of the day.
[00:18:22] Kym: That is so cool. And then you decided you're just gonna come back for a little bit and chill and in the states.
[00:18:28] Sarah: Yeah, so as my, you know, we loved it, but you know, we have these young kids and we have grandparents that wanna see these young
[00:18:36] Kym: Yeah.
[00:18:37] Sarah: and you know, I have aging parents and I think we felt really conflicted about being far away from them. So we made the decision for at least this next season in life to be closer.
[00:18:50] where we can see them regularly. And everything has its pros and cons, right? It was not an easy decision and we still will be doing some traveling, but for the time being, it feels good to have a home base, although we're not quite there yet. I'm still in an Airbnb right now.
[00:19:04] We're still looking. All of our stuff is still in storage, so, we're still kind of in the transition, but I do look forward to having some stability for a little bit and then using this as a home base to travel.
[00:19:16] Kym: Yeah, we're right there too. It gets a little exhausting after a while. You kind of need to chill a little bit. Well, it's so interesting. Gosh, I love how you've just incorporated that into your life and your work as well. I mean, therapists, we can pretty much do it seamlessly, but you know, I never know about like lawyers and that sort of thing, how it works, and it's
[00:19:34] Sarah: Yeah. And you know, that's why I picked being a trademark lawyer because trademark registration is federal. I can do it from anywhere. I can do it in all 50 states all around the world. I have clients in Canada, Australia, and all different countries. And so there aren't any state rules around that.
[00:19:51] If I were like an estate planner or did real estate law or something, it wouldn't be nearly as easy. So it was definitely intentional to do this as well as the digital shop, which is more of a passive income product for
[00:20:05] Kym: I, I love that. Yeah. So for the listeners, if they wanted to, they could go to your shop. If they're like, gosh, I just wanna like branch into coaching a little bit, there's like a template packet that they can just go and grab and plug and play and it's, they're legal and they're good to go.
[00:20:19] Sarah: Yep. The starter coaches bundle is what they would be looking
[00:20:22] Kym: I And for the trademarking, do you have bundles for that or is that something you specifically have to meet with you for and, and go through the process?
[00:20:29] Sarah: Yeah, so that's separate. My trademark law firm is called Twist Law. They don't have to meet with me. You can buy a trademark package directly from the website. I know all of my clients it's direct whether, you know, I do work with a paralegal sometimes, and I have other attorneys that I might work with.
[00:20:45] But it's important to me to develop that relationship. And I actually, you know, some of my trademark clients have been with me for. Almost 10 years, right? Almost as long as I've been doing this. Because, once you have one trademark, you want a second one and a third one, and it can be kind of addicting.
[00:21:03] But as your businesses grow, your trademark needs change and, and grow as well. So, that's something that I really love to do and it's very hands-on for me, which I like.
[00:21:15] Kym: Oh my gosh. I need to consult with you.
[00:21:17] Sarah: Yeah.
[00:21:18] Kym: a new product launching, but it's like complicated, so I'm like, which pieces do I trademark? Do I trademark all the pieces? It's just so I
[00:21:25] Sarah: love it. That's my, that's my jam, Kim, so we
[00:21:27] Kym: Okay. Alright, cool. Well thank you so much Sarah. This is so much fun to learn about what you do and hear about your travels and all that.
[00:21:34] So I hope you guys will go check around and tell us one more time where all did they find you?
[00:21:38] Sarah: yeah, absolutely. So Instagram at the Legit Coach, you know, I post. Legal tips and tricks on there. There's travel stuff on there, kiddos on there. That's kind of the best place to be in touch and I'm always happy to, to connect in the dms. And then if you're interested in a trademark, that would be it. Twist Law.
[00:21:56] And then all of the contracts are@destinationlegal.com. And then our newest, you know, brand adventures, the legit coach.com. So you can find me lots of places.
[00:22:06] Kym: I love it. Oh, a girl after my own heart. well, thank you so much. It's been a pleasure talking to you.
[00:22:11] Sarah: Yeah. Thanks for having me.