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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 prod

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
        I don’t, but I do work at a successful, profitable startup that has grown from 3 to 18 people, so I’ve seen how these things work to some extent. My parents also ran a small business that had a trademark dispute with a large fmcg company, so know how companies will protect their brands (and that it is possible to reach a compromise which protects both businesses interests). I also have some small side-hobby projects that are minorly profitable but also don’t have any overheads (so profit isn’t hard!). I’ve not seen anyone else have to give their credentials though. Do you only need credentials for people you disagree with?

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
        I don’t, but I do work at a successful, profitable startup that has grown from 3 to 18 people, so I’ve seen how these things work to some extent. My parents also ran a small business that had a trademark dispute with a large fmcg company, so know how companies will protect their brands (and that it is possible to reach a compromise which protects both businesses interests). I also have some small side-hobby projects that are minorly profitable but also don’t have any overheads (so profit isn’t hard!). I’ve not seen anyone else have to give their credentials though. Do you only need credentials for people you disagree with?