The provisional patent application focuses on the technical details of your invention. And nobody knows your invention better than you--the inventor.

By the time you communicate your invention to a patent attorney, you've already burned through a lot of money. I know. I'm a patent attorney. I've helped hundreds of inventors get patents since 2001. I'm not opposed to using an attorney, but there are times when you can be more efficient in your innovation process.

No. Never prepare your own non-provisional patent application. I've never seen one prepared by an inventor that was ready to file. Even experienced patent attorneys struggle to get the right language, technical detail, and claim scope over several drafts of a non-provisional patent application.

You can prepare and file your own provisional patent application. And you probably should. The provisional patent application process is a great advantage for products that are going through technical and market validation.

Don't innovate in a vacuum.

When you have "patent pending" status, you can confidently seek technical and market feedback on the aspects of your invention that are "patent pending." This is critical to good product development cycles. You don't want to protect only your initial ideas, and don't get stuck protecting only your final design.

Provisional patent applications allow you to get incremental "patent pending" status as you innovate, with input from others along the way.

You should seek "patent pending" at the following stages in your innovation journey:

• Before you begin sharing your idea without confidentiality
• Before you begin selling or offering your invention for sale
• Each time you make a significant improvement to your design
• Before you talk with industry experts or potential licensing deals
• Before approaching manufacturers, even for early prototypes
• Before pitching your business to an investor
• Before sharing your invention in a business competition
• After you finalize the design for commercialization

If you plan ahead, filing 1-3 provisional patent applications throughout your product development process will be sufficient. You don't have to file a new application at every single stage. And even if you file multiple applications, it will still cost you less than hiring an attorney or paying an online legal services company.

Filing patent applications can get expensive fast. Most inventors don't file many patent applications simply due to the cost. If you have to engage a patent attorney and spend thousands of dollars every time you make incremental improvements to your product design, you would bankrupt your business before you launch your product.

However, if you can duplicate the provisional patent application process yourself, then you could easily file enough provisional patent applications to cover your entire product development process for a few hundred dollars in government filing fees.

The provisional patent application is critical to protecting your invention. If you publicly disclose your invention, sell it, try to sell it, or do a number of other things before filing, you will definitely lose patent rights in your invention.

You might be able to save some U.S. patent rights under the current 12-month grace period, but you will lose virtually all patent rights in foreign countries.

Don't jeopardize your global patent rights unintentionally or recklessly when you don't have to.

You don't know up front whether you can create a viable market for your product. Why would you do anything to jeopardize your patent rights in foreign countries, which might be key to getting your product manufactured and distributed, even if your primary market is in the United States.

If you're not thinking globally now, maybe you should keep innovating until you come up with a product worth global commercialization.

Our online workshop walks through the entire process from start to finish. The full workshop includes detailed instructions and examples in 5 full modules over 16 hours, following every step and process of and experienced patent attorney.

If you just want an intro, you can sign up for our FREE trial. This includes enough guidance to document your innovation using our proprietary Innovation Disclosure Form (IDF) in about 1 hour. If you're unsure whether to DIY your provisional patent application, get started here. If you're going to hire a patent attorney, at least take your completed IDF to save some time (and money, hopefully).

For the full workshop, sign up, log in, and start today. Each workshop participant receives all the online video access, downloadable reference materials, interactive tools, and instruction necessary to complete the workshop objectives.

You can access the FREE trial with just your email address. You won't get full access to our membership site and additional resources at this time.

I'm not going to tell you, "Don't hire a patent attorney." If you have the finances to engage an attorney, and your innovation process doesn't require iterative product design cycles, you prefer to pay somebody else to do the heavy lifting, or you simply don't think you can do it, then hiring a patent attorney might be your best option. If this is your preference, use the link at the top of this page to CONTACT US TODAY!

Ironically, if you were to hire me, I might include access to this workshop and ask you to go through some of the content anyway. Why would I do that? Here are the top reasons:

• This workshop answers the questions I've already answered thousands of times before for other inventors
• This workshop empowers inventors to contribute to the patent process, resulting in a more cohesive collaboration between technical and legal processesFULL Workshop: The most detailed instructions and examples in 5 full modules over 16 hours, following every step and process of and experienced patent attorney. If you can't dedicate 16 hours of your time, don't choose this option.
• This workshop helps inventors understand the expectations, timelines, costs, and critical decisions inherent in the patent process