A novel business idea can quickly attract competition, but there are many ways to turn this into an advantage
You’re about to launch your new business when you find a rival with an almost identical idea. How do you respond? Give up? Rethink it? Or race to be the first to market?
That was the scenario facing entrepreneurs Massimiliano Gritti and Elliott Aeschlimann Perales right before their business went live. They planned to launch Bombinate as an online marketplace for new brands to sell men’s clothing and accessories. And by last December they had secured 30 suppliers from seven countries. Then, in January – a month away from the planned launch – they attended the Pitti menswear fair in Florence, Italy where they encountered a nasty surprise – another business competing for the same customers and brands.
“The future of our soon-to-launch company was now in question,” says Gritti. After the initial shock, the founders worked to make their offering more compelling. As well as an online marketplace, they decided to offer other services to their sellers.
These included helping them to create digital content, such as videos and photography, for their websites by connecting them with trusted content agencies and photographers. Bombinate would then promote the content on social media and analyse the traffic it received. With this new model complete, Bombinate is launching this month.
Leon Ifayemi and Omar Fahmi are the founders of SPCE, a search app for student accommodation. They also had to rework their business idea in its early stages. While crowdfunding in March they were contacted by two larger competitors with a view to working together. But they declined, instead using the interest to strengthen their business.
Read more >> https://www.theguardian.com/small-business-network/2017/may/04/arch-rival-success-fledgling-startup-entrepreneurs
