Copycat Competitor

[88LS]

Long time lurker first time poster here. Okay so I read the book, quit my job, started my own company selling innovative health related supplements (for about 3 months now) and have been doing well, to the point where I am able to sustain myself.

I am pretty much the only company that are selling these specific category of health supplements (not illegal) in my country and a few weeks ago I came across a guy who is also now selling the exact same supplements. At first I thought well it's no biggie as we are better than him from every business angle, his site was so amateur and not ranking etc. that I genuinely didn't think much of it.

Now when I went to check up yesterday I saw that this guy has created a whole new site, through the exact same ecommerce platform that I'm using, same format of text layout for products, some sentences of text I had on at one point, SEO info almost the same and he actually named one of his supplement categories to include part of our brand name. Few days ago we received a bogus order of gibberish info which I am almost 100% certain is him trying to copy our payment and delivery methods.

I should add that I do have a smoking gun on this guy, as from my research I saw that he is a doctor and one of the supplements he is selling is a scheduled, licensed medical product here which you are not allowed to sell openly to the public. I can go ahead and write the licensed manufacturer and the medical board a letter, essentially ratting him out, but that's a low blow and not sure if I'm getting ahead of myself.

Now I know this guy is watching us, so my question is what can/should I do about it? I mean it's irritating because every innovative idea that I execute, this guy is probably going to go and copy exactly. Oh and sorry for the length of the post and cryptic nature, any advice would be much appreciated.

 

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[theag]

Execute better.

I have a copycat like that too. Copied my whole landing page concept, wording, even my main advertising tag line, copying my content ideas, product features, etc. Everytime I do something new they copy it within days or weeks.

But I dont give a F*ck and simply outspend them on marketing (massively), create better products and sell them cheaper. Until they give up and go cry to their mommys. Also have a trademark now on some stuff they're using so might sue them into bankruptcy soon .

F*ckers.

 

[bradipaus]

as for a car racing ... You 're the 1st, he's following.

keep doing your best to increase the distance and you will win

 

[eliquid]

I can relate to this.

Although I do not have a specific recommendation for you and your situation, my advice to you is to, "Accept It, Outperform Them"

I won't get into specifics, but I have been copied more times than I can count in different industries. I used to lose sleep over it and spend my days thinking of what I could do to them and complaining to everyone that would listen to me about it each time it happened.

In the end, none of what I was doing was helping me and it was actually driving me insane and hurting my business and personal life.

After a while, I learned that no matter who, what, where, when, or how for what I did and what industry I was in... there would be copycats clawing their way to try to bring me down and ride on my coat tails thinking they can surpass me.

It comes with the territory. It happens all the time, there is no way to stop it.

• Ever wonder why on every corner where there is a Walgreens, there is a CVS or Rite-Aid?
• Ever wonder why on Alibaba every manufacture can sell what some other manufacture created?
  
• Everything Adwords innovates on, Bing copies?
  
• Samsung rips everything anyone does ( including Apple and many other companies )

These big companies really have no real recourse, do you think you will too?

 

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[DennisD]

Eyes forward bucko. Is he actively hurting your sales, or just your ego?
Keep hustlin and you'll be the trailblazer and he'll be the loser.

I can go ahead and write the licensed manufacturer and the medical board a letter, essentially ratting him out, but that's a low blow and not sure if I'm getting ahead of myself.

Low blow? I don't think so.

He's scamming the licensed manufacturer out of money, and creating a culture of unchecked (possibly unsafe) drug distribution which makes everybody in the industry look bad.

It's illegal, he knew what he was doing when he did it. I'd just pull the trigger and tattle.
If you're worried about saving face, make it an anonymous letter.

 

[88LS]

Thanks for the replies guys, really informative. At the moment he is not actively hurting our sales, he's probably getting the odd one here or there while we get the majority - Because honestly we do everything better, from product and price to marketing. I'm just a bit worried he get's a foothold and might have some more capital to work with than us. He bought a 1000 units of stock for each product, which is quite a large investment in this case and as a doctor he might have some good connections.

I guess what it boils down to is that if we have people copying us exactly and staking their whole business model on every move we make, we must be doing something right and others must be seeing value in what and how we are doing things. So for now i'll call it flattery, but when push comes to shove, I'm hitting send on that letter.

 

[Dwight Schrute]

https://www.thefastlaneforum.com/community/threads/please-bid-on-your-brand-name.61311/
https://www.thefastlaneforum.com/community/threads/please-bid-on-your-brand-name.61311/
Better bid on your brand name, before the evil doctor does

 

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[Weaponize]

I'd also chime in with this: https://www.thefastlaneforum.com/community/threads/your-goal-is-to-increase-cpcs.52525/

@Andy Black has his shite together!

 

[obrian]

nothing is wrong with copying, you just of to focus and your side of things and don't give a damn about what your so called copycat is doing and make sure yours is better and provide enough value so that the customers prefer you or else you get f@@k trust me .