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Need help with Copyright Infringement of Template Design or Digital File Download?

Need help with Copyright Infringement of your Template Design?

Have you had your Intellectual Property stolen?

We would like to help you with your Copyright Protection!

Here at Business Documents UK Ltd we have had some experience with copyright infringement. We have had to contact a selection of online businesses that have been offering our template formats (recreated or directly copied) for free or for onward sale.

In all cases so far, the templates have been provided to them by freelancers, and in all cases so far the company in question has acknowledged the infringement, and has withdrawn the offending items, after varying lengths of correspondence and discussion. None so far have required legal action. So far.

Template Email to company infringing your copyrighted product:

The below template is a fairly informal note that you can use to make an amicable first contact. Please feel free to use this, and then follow the next steps underneath.

Dear Sirs,
It has come to our attention that there is evidence of an infringement of our copyrighted intellectual property on your website.
We are assuming you have been provided this by a 3rd party, and would like to help you resolve this ASAP.
For reference, the {item} you have on {URL} is a copy of our copyrighted material at {URL}.
Also, for the avoidance of doubt you can see our copyright notice here {insert link}.
We are happy to help you address any questions or doubts raised if you were provided this by a 3rd party to discuss this infringement – it’s clearly something you need to avoid recurring, and can cause a slur on your good brand.
Please let us know as quickly as possible how you would like to proceed.
You will appreciate that we take this very seriously, as this intellectual property is an important part of our business.
Kind Regards,
{Person}
{Title}
{Company Footer}

Send that email as you can, and the response should help you decide how to proceed.

Next Steps

  1. Best Case – Immediate Cooperation : If they respond well – stay in touch and build a relationship – you are in the same business area, and could benefit from this. We are living evidence that this has happened.
  2. Likely Case – More Evidence Required : If they claim to have originated the format (i.e. that there is no infringement) or just think you are chancing it, or even deluded, they are likely to contest your claims. Respond calmly, and provide whatever evidence you can find; professional signed evidence from a respected colleague; dated archive from The Web Archive (I love that website!); dated emails and dated file information – whatever you can provide!! NB stay calm. Always.
  3. Getting Worse – No Response : If you hear nothing back, do not be disheartened. DO NOT RESORT TO AGGRESSIVE LANGUAGE – It never helps. Resend your email, and send a hard copy to their business address, on your logo’d paper. Follow them on twitter, facebook, G+, and send them professional and kind messages via these social networks.
  4. Worse Still – No Cooperation : At this stage I would advise issuing the DMCA copyright notice from Scribd, and send a hard copy to the business too.
  5. Worst Case – you need some help combating the offender : Be careful here, you could get into a quarrel or legal battle – a big energy and resource drain. If you are absolutely sure of your case, and believe the offender is being deliberately, then you could approach e.g. Google here to report and request removal from their search indexing. If you are in the USA, there is a list of copyright infringement agents who can help here.

NB – ALWAYS STAY CALM. We have surprisingly developed some business relationships with a couple of the organisations who were unwittingly infringing our copyright.

The UK Copyright Service has some great materials and information to help you with Copyright.

If you are in the same business as Business Documents UK (downloadable document template files) you are more than welcome to use our Copyright Notice if you like – just drop us an email or link back to us for reference.

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Dynamic Status Dials – to communicate project status with RAG on a single page.

Sydney at Night – Zoomed in.

Communicating a large amount of information on any project into a simple,  easier to read and digest format is always something of a challenge. The trick is to focus on the key areas and “zoom” in on them.

We have read a fair bit of conventional wisdom which states that creating the ideal dashboard template should be kept simple (we agree) and that attempting to replicate the most traditional of dashboards in that of a car is to be avoided as it is not necessary. This struck a chord with us as we fundamentally disagreed – after all, cars display the most complex of information in a format which is universally accepted and which in spite of digital advances has remained largely the same using dials with redder bits akin to a RAG status.

So we started to build one and soon understood the reason behind conventional wisdom – making a car dashboard which is fully automated, pleasant on the eye and useful to those looking at it is really quite difficult! Being that difficult is our middle name (well it is documents but you get the gist) we would not take really quite difficult as an answer so persevered and finally late one night we had done it.

You can see our status template with dynamic dials here.

…in all of its 3-colour glory!

We are quite proud of it, but as ever, feedback is always welcome. As an added incentive, the first 5 people who can e-mail us with “How hard could it be” in the title will get a free version to give it a test drive.

Our Status Templates

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How to effectively compare companies, products, services or even people.

Let’s consider the picture above for a brief moment. We know that each vehicle here is going to be a different make, model, specification and colour, but from our initial view point all we can see is a very similar array of vehicles. Asked to chose the best one for any particular purpose (other than maybe size), we are going to have to use guess work and it will be a lot more luck than judgement if we get it right.

The snow which so confuses the issue here is like a marketing campaign or a very good sales person; unless you get beneath the outer layer, you can only judge on what you see. We tend to view this as an issue in the world of procurement from a sense of buying poor goods or services from a very good sales force, but over the years we have found that increasingly it can translate as missing a superb offering because of an inexperienced way of selling.

Running full blown RFI’s will always get to the core of an offering and on a large spend or critical piece of outsourcing this has to be the way forward unless you have an intimate market knowledge. If you don’t and it’s a crowded market, the question is how do you devise your short-list first? For every tender you issue, someone is going to have to score it, and if you really want to be focussing your energies on evaluating the cream rather than working through the, well, not so creamy.

To that end, we at BDUK have always employed a short-listing comparison tool to whittle down the market to a more suitable and manageable number of companies to then approach.

Not only does this make our life’s simpler, but we have learnt the hard way that to run a short-list tender with the short-list leaves us wide open when a friend of the board has a company doing exactly what we are buying and we not only did not include them, but have nothing in the way of justification as to why.

Self preservation. It should be our company motto.

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How to look good at work (from a business rather than image perspective!)

We have been on some management courses over the last few months and having let the dust settle (thus avoiding the immediate post course evangelicalism which irks even the most tolerant mind) we have come to the conclusion that we have actually learnt a great deal and that it is relevant. And useful. And in some cases actually surprising!

1. Niche is good, no matter what your niche is. So long as there is a market.

Progressive Corp is an insurance company which focusses on all the types of people the other firms avoid like the plague.

So, know your market. REALLY know your market and show that you know it through market analysis tools. Such as Porters Five Forces or PEST.

2.  Synergies are not always actually a good idea. Most companies have traditionally thought they are, but the world has changed.

It is more demanding and quite simply it is a tough market out there; focus on what you are good at, world class at, and do it.

This means that backwards or reverse integration is not the answer. Outsourcing is. Unless you are world class at it. (You get the gist). Japanese car manufacturers realised very early on that they were not as good as the electronic companies at making stereos, so they did not try and complete, they just struck up a deal. Get good at finding who in the market can deliver what you need for you, via procurement channels. Or have a look here.

3. IGNORE your customer.  Yep, you read that right. Ignore them. Not on everything, of course, answer the phone, respond to e-mail and help them.

But think what would have happened if Steve Jobs had asked the mobile phone using public what they wanted from a phone and then given it to them? It would not have been anywhere near the i-phone by a long, long way. He didn’t ask, he gave them something they hadn’t even dreamed of yet.

4. Customise your output in what ever you do. Make it fit the needs of what you are doing not the other way around.

These are the highlights, there was a lot more!

If anything has struck you, contact us. If point 4 has struck a chord and you want to talk about how our content could be modified to fit your needs, PLEASE contact us. We shan’t follow our own advice concerning point 3!

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Business Roadmap with SWOT Analysis

We’ve added a Business Roadmap, which features a Business Plan Timeline, and a SWOT analysis.

Business Roadmap Template Features

Timeline for your Business Roadmap

The Business Roadmap Template, featuring a SWOT analysis

Outline the activities on your Business Plan with this Timeline section.

Features

  • Activities bars
  • Milestone markers
  • Output markers

Workstreams

  1. Marketing & Sales
  2. Product
  3. Business Support
  4. Finance

SWOT analysis alongside your Business Plan

Show your key stakeholders and investors that you have the bases covered, and are making the most of your Business opportunities.

  1. Strengths
  2. Weaknesses
  3. Opportunities
  4. Threats

Download the Business Roadmap Template today

Download here