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I think it's a distraction. You're building a product. Do you really want to waste time and mental effort on this? I think it's a low energy move on the competi

by bko 6y ago

I think it's a distraction. You're building a product. Do you really want to waste time and mental effort on this? I think it's a low energy move on the competitors part and will hurt them in the end.

johnwheeler 6y ago
Not sure why this is getting downvoted because it’s the right answer. Them being a well-funded competitor doesn’t spell doom for your company, and if your product is successful, it’s 100% going to have competition, so just ignore it and keep trucking. Get used to the fact that you’re going to have copycats and some might even be more successful than you for a variety of reasons. So what?
- Closi 6y ago
  It might not be the right answer. If legal action forces a major competitive threat to rebrand that can help on multiple fronts: - If users could get easily confused between the brandnames during a google search, that confusion can hurt your growth and unfairly bolster growth for the competitor. - If the competitor has to rebrand they are building the brand again from scratch, which decreases their competitive threat. Successful founders need to be able to balance their time between both product and the realities of running a business, so simply dismissing this as "not worth time" without knowing more about the opposing business, branding and competitive threat is overly simplistic.
  - johnwheeler 6y ago
    Lot of “if”s there. There’s plenty more where those came from. Do you see where I’m going with this?
    - Closi 6y ago
      No - I don't really to be honest... could you elaborate?
      - johnwheeler 6y ago
        Sure. You can't run a business worrying about things that might happen one day. There's a never ending supply of them. Instead, you should focus on product and customer acquisition. It's as simple as that really. Most people think that before they start a business, they need to have legal liability protection, trademarks, even patents. That's totally ridiculous. You need a product and customers before any of those. It doesn't have to be 100s of customers. 2 is enough. Because if you never get those 2 customers, all those other ifs don't mean a thing. The likelihood of you building something that's both customer-less and valuable enough to need all that protection is probably close to zero. Businesses become valuable when they have customers and cash flows. That's when you need to start worrying about people storming your castle. Not before.
        Closi 6y ago
        You also can’t run a business ignoring competitive threats. Your post seems to assume that OP has no customers - but the post stated they were getting traction already. It’s overly simplistic to say “just focus on product and customer acquisition” - in fact it’s likely bad advice. Founders need to wear many hats, and one of those is not simply ignoring when competitors are on your turf which the original post suggests. And successful founders will obviously think about what might happen as a result of their actions and make balanced judgements on the back of that. Your suggestion to not respond to things that “might” happen is again bad advice in my opinion - actually they need to consider how likely things are to impact you. As an early phase startup will a well funded competitor having a very similar brand name hurt? Very likely! So they should certainly consider how they are going to respond and not just ignore it.
        johnwheeler 6y ago
        What profitable business do you run? Where do you get your insight? Before I consider it, I want to make sure you’re not armchair quarterbacking here
        Closi 6y ago
muzani 6y ago
As a startup, the market is often not mature yet and a lot of work needs to be put into growing the market. Two competitors in the same field often grow the market faster than two people doing two different things. Android and iOS are great competitors, but would the touchscreen market be as big without both of these? Or would people have stuck with Symbian and BlackBerry? Just let your competitors grow, focus on improving your product. Let your competitors spend big money on marketing and branding. Then steal their users with a superior product.
- Gustomaximus 6y ago
  > Let your competitors spend big money on marketing and branding. Then steal their users with a superior product. This is potentially poor advice. There are many examples of where a inferior product grabs market share and revenue to fund their ongoing growth via marketing and leaves a great product in the dust. Both product and marketing are important and in my limited experience Id take great marketing/distribution over a greater product as sad at this is to what seems logically correct.

by bko 6y ago

johnwheeler 6y ago

Not sure why this is getting downvoted because it’s the right answer. Them being a well-funded competitor doesn’t spell doom for your company, and if your product is successful, it’s 100% going to have competition, so just ignore it and keep trucking. Get used to the fact that you’re going to have copycats and some might even be more successful than you for a variety of reasons. So what?

Closi 6y ago
It might not be the right answer. If legal action forces a major competitive threat to rebrand that can help on multiple fronts: - If users could get easily confused between the brandnames during a google search, that confusion can hurt your growth and unfairly bolster growth for the competitor. - If the competitor has to rebrand they are building the brand again from scratch, which decreases their competitive threat. Successful founders need to be able to balance their time between both product and the realities of running a business, so simply dismissing this as "not worth time" without knowing more about the opposing business, branding and competitive threat is overly simplistic.
- johnwheeler 6y ago
  Lot of “if”s there. There’s plenty more where those came from. Do you see where I’m going with this?
  - Closi 6y ago
    No - I don't really to be honest... could you elaborate?
    - johnwheeler 6y ago
      Sure. You can't run a business worrying about things that might happen one day. There's a never ending supply of them. Instead, you should focus on product and customer acquisition. It's as simple as that really. Most people think that before they start a business, they need to have legal liability protection, trademarks, even patents. That's totally ridiculous. You need a product and customers before any of those. It doesn't have to be 100s of customers. 2 is enough. Because if you never get those 2 customers, all those other ifs don't mean a thing. The likelihood of you building something that's both customer-less and valuable enough to need all that protection is probably close to zero. Businesses become valuable when they have customers and cash flows. That's when you need to start worrying about people storming your castle. Not before.
      - Closi 6y ago
        You also can’t run a business ignoring competitive threats. Your post seems to assume that OP has no customers - but the post stated they were getting traction already. It’s overly simplistic to say “just focus on product and customer acquisition” - in fact it’s likely bad advice. Founders need to wear many hats, and one of those is not simply ignoring when competitors are on your turf which the original post suggests. And successful founders will obviously think about what might happen as a result of their actions and make balanced judgements on the back of that. Your suggestion to not respond to things that “might” happen is again bad advice in my opinion - actually they need to consider how likely things are to impact you. As an early phase startup will a well funded competitor having a very similar brand name hurt? Very likely! So they should certainly consider how they are going to respond and not just ignore it.
        johnwheeler 6y ago
        What profitable business do you run? Where do you get your insight? Before I consider it, I want to make sure you’re not armchair quarterbacking here
        Closi 6y ago

muzani 6y ago

As a startup, the market is often not mature yet and a lot of work needs to be put into growing the market. Two competitors in the same field often grow the market faster than two people doing two different things. Android and iOS are great competitors, but would the touchscreen market be as big without both of these? Or would people have stuck with Symbian and BlackBerry? Just let your competitors grow, focus on improving your product. Let your competitors spend big money on marketing and branding. Then steal their users with a superior product.

Gustomaximus 6y ago
> Let your competitors spend big money on marketing and branding. Then steal their users with a superior product. This is potentially poor advice. There are many examples of where a inferior product grabs market share and revenue to fund their ongoing growth via marketing and leaves a great product in the dust. Both product and marketing are important and in my limited experience Id take great marketing/distribution over a greater product as sad at this is to what seems logically correct.