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On Competition

Started by koichi · 6 months ago

One of the feelings that most entrepreneurs experience at some point is that of competition. (Actually, if you don’t ever feel that you probably aren’t going down the right path.) Most great ideas have not one competitor but a number of them. There were at least 50 v ... Continue reading »

6 comments

  • Andrew Warner

    2 years ago

    Whenever a new competitor comes into my industry, I congratulate myself on getting a new R&D department for free. Let them spend money trying a bunch of different features. I'll learn from the one or two effective ideas that they come up with.
    reply
  • Jody Baty

    2 years ago

    “The purpose of competition is not to beat someone down, but to bring out the best in every player.” Walter Wheeler

    I was recently at a tradeshow where my main competitor was located two booths down from me. For the first day or so, we just kind of gave each other silly looks and it was awkward. Then we started to talk and went for lunch together. Several things became apparent:

    - the e-learning market is enormous and there's plenty of room for multiple vendors.
    - the key is to 'niche thyself', as Guy Kawasaki recommends. Make your product different enough from each other to target different segments.
    - You can learn about yourself from how your competition perceives you.
    - And, who knows, maybe someday these will be the guys interested in buying your business or vice-versa
    reply
  • alex

    2 years ago

    Competition is definitely a good thing, it shows you're on to something and also allows you to sharpen your vision.

    Every time I start to think about competition too much, I remember a Jeff Bezos quote which is something like: Focus on the customer, not the competition. At the end of the day, competition is a form of validation but ultimately your users only care about what is going to work for them.

    In a network economy though, competition takes on some different aspects. People don't want to be where other people aren't... this is the toughest challenge facing entrepreneurs on the web-- building community is a lot harder if someone else already has a big, diverse, and robust community
    reply
  • Dave Trager

    2 years ago

    Bravo! A wonderful perspective as always. I especially love number 4-- it would serve many to remember that. =)
    reply
  • Jessica

    2 years ago

    Absolutely. In everything you do you should focus on the customer.

    Your competition is only your competition if they can keep you from getting to your customer. If they can't, then they are merely a part of the ecosystem - part of your industry.

    Best,
    J.
    reply
  • sundeep

    2 years ago

    Totally, totally agree. Especially in our current Web 2.0, everyones-got-two-startups environment, it's critical to stay focused on what YOU are doing (of course, a peek now and again can be helpful :)
    reply

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