When Brand Protection Tools Miss the Mark: Claims Vs. Capability

Brand Protection professionals need more than surface-level visibility and scattergun takedowns; they need real outcomes.

In the world of Brand Protection, most technology providers follow a familiar playbook: scan more, detect more, take down more. It sounds impressive, but for many companies, the outcome is frustrating. 

The reality often includes irrelevant results, slow enforcement, and dashboards filled with vanity metrics that don’t reflect real-world protection. That’s because most solutions rely on outdated methods, including large-scale manual takedowns and surface-level automation. ‘Retrofitted AI’ is particularly common; many tools aren’t AI-native but instead bolt AI onto legacy systems. These tools rely on:

• Static keyword lists
• Shallow scraping with no semantic context
• Manual classification and takedown queues

Counterfeiters have already adapted. And for brands trying to stay ahead, this approach just doesn’t deliver. Meaningful protection can’t be faked. It takes smarter technology, better data, and a solution that understands the complexity of infringement at every level.

Visibility is broken — and bad actors know it

Visibility is often positioned as the first win in a Brand Protection program. But in today’s threat landscape, simply seeing the surface-level threats isn’t enough. Counterfeiters know exactly how to exploit gaps in protection — and they do so constantly. They take advantage of fragmented systems, outdated tech, and human bandwidth limits.

Here’s how they stay ahead:

• By replicating listings with minor tweaks
  A single image can appear in hundreds of listings with slight alterations. If your system can’t reliably link those variations, it treats them as new threats — or misses them entirely.
• By hiding in plain sight across platforms
  Sellers constantly manipulate keywords and product visuals to slip through detection. Whether it’s using special characters, spacing tricks, or visually disguising logos and packaging, these tactics are designed to slip through traditional systems.
• By flooding marketplaces with low-risk listings
  Most moderation efforts focus on high-visibility targets. Meanwhile, counterfeiters flood the long tail, knowing many programs won’t catch everything.

Traditional platforms struggle because:

• Detection is often limited to brand-trained models or based on basic keyword logic, failing to catch nuanced or unfamiliar threats.
• The lack of true automation means analysts spend hours cleaning and categorising — not acting.
• Data is captured without being structured — leaving brands with noise instead of insight.

For a deeper look at how counterfeiters and other bad actors operate today, read our blog: An Invisible War: The Growth of Dupe Culture & Its Ramifications for Brands.

What brands achieve with next-generation Brand Protection technology

Today’s leading brands are pushing beyond cosmetic features and static dashboards; they’re leveraging intelligent automation to deliver real, measurable protection.

Corsearch Zeal 2.0 — the AI-native Brand Protection platform engineered to do more than detect and takedown — gives brands real-time control, measurable impact, and the power to outsmart threats at speed and scale.

With semi-exact image matching, brand teams can surface altered or disguised counterfeits automatically — even when product images have been rotated, filtered, cropped, or overlaid with new backgrounds or text. This cuts down time spent on irrelevant results and enables faster enforcement on confirmed violations. It also connects back to previous infringement groups so teams aren’t starting from scratch every time.

AI-powered filtering and moderation helps reduce manual effort. Smart rules cluster and sort results in real time, enabling teams to scale enforcement across thousands of listings efficiently.

Advanced logo and product detection improves accuracy — especially in cluttered spaces like social media or resale platforms — by understanding which brand is truly being targeted, even when the visual context is complex. This also helps with “non-text” listings like SKUs or product catalog info.

Unlike retrofitted solutions that tack AI onto older systems, this platform is built AI-native from the ground up. It can track image variations at scale, identify logos as brand-specific (not just pattern-based), and categorize products across 300+ categories using both image and text. These capabilities empower brands to moderate, cluster, and act with far greater speed and precision than traditional “exact match” or basic similarity-based tools allow.

Enabling deeper insights and better decisions

The real power of intelligent protection lies not just in detection — but in actionable insight. Corsearch Zeal 2.0 helps brands move from data accumulation to data clarity.

Built-in AI feedback loops refine results in real time based on what each brand actually cares about. If irrelevant listings are flagged, the system learns. If threat behaviour evolves, detection evolves too. The Impact Score prioritizes high-risk listings based on spread and threat level.

Centralized reporting makes it easier to track progress, uncover emerging threat patterns, and identify enforcement opportunities. The KPI Dashboard offers real-time visibility into post takedowns, account actions, and channel-specific performance. Metrics like the Cleanliness Score™ don’t just show visibility; they indicate how effectively a brand is protected across specific platforms or keywords, helping teams focus where impact is needed most.

While many competitors offer visibility scores, these can be misleading if built on incomplete or low-quality data. Counterfeiters know exactly how to exploit gaps in surface-level protection, and brands without full threat visibility risk thinking they’re covered when they’re not. The Cleanliness Score™ is designed to offer a more accurate picture, showing where efforts are working, and where threats still slip through.

Enforcement performance can also be measured across time, allowing brands to see which platforms respond best and where escalation may be required.

Total coverage, across every critical channel

Modern infringement doesn’t just live on Amazon or eBay. Brands use Corsearch Zeal 2.0 to monitor everything from mainstream marketplaces and social media to independent webstores, paid search, and — coming soon — app stores, 3D printing libraries, and NFTs.

Coverage includes:

• Marketplaces like Amazon, eBay, and Fruugo
• Social platforms like Instagram, Facebook, TikTok
• Emerging areas such as NFTs, messaging apps, and paid media
• Grey market detection using language, metadata, and seller behavior
• Online-to-offline mapping using contact extraction and cluster analysis

This broad coverage allows brands to uncover entire networks of infringers, not just isolated listings — and to disrupt operations at the source.

From feature to outcome

Some platforms may market a “visibility score” or offer some form of automation, but the reality is often shallow: limited platform coverage, slow moderation, or lack of real-time data. Without human-in-the-loop insights and adaptive technology, these tools become little more than activity trackers.

Brands don’t need vanity metrics. They need the tools to enforce smarter, act faster, and prove real-world results — that’s something Corsearch Zeal 2.0 enables every day.

Outcome comparison: Corsearch Zeal 2.0 vs. other platforms

Ready to explore next-generation Brand Protection?

Corsearch Zeal 2.0 isn’t just an advancement — it’s a new standard for Brand Protection outcomes. If you’re ready to move beyond vanity metrics and detect what others miss, let’s talk.

See how Corsearch Zeal 2.0 can transform your program.