Copycats: The Sincerest Form of Validation

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, as the saying goes. But I believe imitation is also a major form of validation.

Creating copycat businesses is looked upon unfavorably by a lot of people, but I’d like to offer a different view on this topic: When someone copies you, it’s a good thing. Yes, really. Copying is technically just another group of people building something to service a need that they also see exists.

One of the reasons that I started Kiip was because I couldn’t remember the last time I – or anybody for that matter – had tapped on a mobile ad on purpose. I knew to succeed, we had to abandon advertising altogether as a conventional concept and to pioneer rewards as an engagement mechanism in the mobile space. Kiip would not be about impressions, clicks or baiting people – it would be about the moment and the serendipity of being surprised by a reward for a real achievement, or moment, in your life.

As we’ve successfully built out this entirely new industry category, the path we’ve trailblazed has gradually been populated by many more footsteps along that same path behind us. Instead of going on the defensive, our strategy has always been to forge our own path. Fretting over others stealing your business model lets them win and will just tax your team in their efforts to make something truly great.

To anyone out there losing sleep over copycats, I would like to share three tips to hopefully help you sleep at night:

• Focus on what’s ahead, not who’s in your rearview mirror. As a rule, copiers can only mimic what they can see. In essence, by the time they latch onto something, they’re already six months late to the game. They don’t know what you have in store, and that puts you ahead of the curve. They’re reverse engineering a concept they’ve seen. But it’s tough to build a airplane from just seeing it. Be confident in the business you’ve built and move forward, not backward.

• Remember, imitators are not competitors. It’s easy to confuse the two, but there's a big difference. A competitor is challenging your market share meaningfully and innovating in their own right, whereas an imitator is a watered-down version of your company. An imitator may have copied your idea, but they cannot transplant your execution. At Kiip, we focused on building the Kiip brand as a seal of authenticity that brands, developers and users could trust. We realized brand love and affinity was innate and difficult to copy. I was inspired by the Intel model, the American Express model. It couldn’t excite me more that American Express is now an investor in Kiip.
• It also bears reminding that real competition is indeed healthy. It kiips you on your toes and it challenges you to be better. It reminds you that there are more players in the game. Taco Bell founder Glen Bell leased a taco stand to Ed Hackbarth, who at the time was an employee, to start a direct competitor: the franchise we all know now as Del Taco. Because most of America at the time had no idea how to pronounce “taco”, the simple presence of a competitor helped educate and build the market faster for both of them.

• Get your IP ducks in a row. Build defensibility into your brand, data, successes and ultimately your ability to execute. Don't forget that plagiarism by others can sometimes be illegal. Be sure to listen to your lawyer for best next steps. Patents are one way to build formal defensibility, but its efficacy continue to be questioned as they can take years to formalize. That’s a lifetime for many startups. Patent trolls are unfortunately becoming more prevalent within the startup scene. Worrying about these things may eventually stifle your execution. Don’t optimize what you create for a patent. Try your best to innovate first.

At the end of the day, don’t sweat it – simply focus building and executing your vision. Nothing can imitate that.