AlexSchleber’s Quick Hits Business Mindhacks

11. Don't Worry about Competitors

When you think you've got a great idea, it's sort of like having a guilty conscience about something. All someone has to do is look at you funny, and you think "Oh my God, they know."

These alarms are almost always false:

Companies that seemed like competitors and threats at first glance usually never were when you really looked at it. Even if they were operating in the same area, they had a different goal.

One reason people overreact to competitors is that they overvalue ideas. If ideas really were the key, a competitor with the same idea would be a real threat. But it's usually execution that matters:

All the scares induced by seeing a new competitor pop up are forgotten weeks later. It always comes down to your own product and approach to the market.

My BOLD highlights.

Worrying about competition (on genuinely new ideas) will only slow you down. Competitive analysis only matters in established markets, but then the Law of Category Leadership / First Mover Advantage should tell you not to want to get into established markets in the first place.

Instead, create a whole new category. If you create something that is 10 TIMES better than what is currently being offered, you almost by definition have created a new category. Example: The iPhone created a whole new category of phone (yes, it has plenty of flaws, but that is not the point). The iPhone "competitors" are still scrambling to catch up.

Newsflash: They will never catch up, unless they themselves innovate and go for 10X better to create another new category.