Tips to Avoid Competitor Copycat Strategies

Cargo cult marketing can sink your brand faster than you can say “copycat.” Marketing can be a grind. I know the struggle firsthand. It’s tempting to glance at your competitors’ playbook and borrow a trick or two. But cargo culting prevents you from standing out, leads to conflicting and confusing brand messaging, and erodes trust and credibility over time. *** But, let’s take a step back for a minute. Cargo culting originates from the behavior observed by some Pacific Island communities during World War II. These communities watched military personnel receive supplies via airdrops. They believed that if they replicated the actions of the personnel on the ground, they could attract similar deliveries. The problem with cargo culting is that there’s no real understanding of the underlying principles, why something works, and under what conditions it will (and won’t) be effective. It assumes a one-size-fits-all approach. Unfortunately, many marketers are doing exactly this. They are blindly imitating successful marketing tactics of other businesses or technologies without fully understanding the underlying principles. This causes people to make choices based on hoping the technique or approach will provide the same level of success. *** For example, let’s say a startup notices a competitor’s articles are ranking well in search engines. So, they decide to scrape the competitor’s keywords and write similar articles. ✨The problem is that simply replicating existing content without adding any additional value or original insights might get you some traffic but your traffic quality and conversions will likely suffer. ✨ Because it turns out the content you created is being consumed almost entirely by people who aren't your ICP and will never have a use for your product or service. Now, you could have avoided this if you took the time to go back to first principles instead of blindly trusting that your competitor's customers and keyword strategy would be just like yours. ✨What you could do instead: ✨ 👉 Conduct keyword and customer research to identify relevant topics and search queries within your niche. 👉 Then, focus on creating original content that addresses the needs and interests based on your audience and customer research. 👉 Address their problems first and foremost and then optimize it for search. 👉 Additionally, highlight your brand’s unique perspectives, insights, and strengths to help differentiate your new content from competitors.

Copying the competition is not an SEO strategy. Many companies look at a competitor's content, site and backlink profile as the starting point for their own efforts. In most cases, even a perfect replica of another company's presence and footprint will not generate the same results because there are many variables that are less visible. Instead of using the competition as the starting point do these 4 things for your strategies: 1/ Define an end goal and develop a strategy to get there completely independent of anyone else in the market 2/ Interview the customers/users of the competition and learn directly from your target market what is missing. Build your SEO and content around that. 3/ Use Google suggest and other keyword tools to find searches related to your competition that they do not have ideal solutions that fit 4/Run an ad campaign on social media targeting users of your competitor with the goal of these users answering a research survey about their product experiences What did I miss?

Stalking competitors kills your product before it launches. Let me explain 👇 Most founders hide behind competitor research and compare features. Then wonder why they built something nobody wanted. The brutal truth? Your 50-page market report is just procrastination dressed up as courage. Here's the painful truth about competitor obsession: You copy limitations, not innovations ↳ You inherit their mental models ↳ You accept their constraints as "industry standard" ↳ You build within their box, not outside it You miss the real opportunity ↳ While you study their features ↳ Someone else is studying user problems ↳ The gap isn't in their solution—it's in their thinking You fight yesterday's battles ↳ By the time you copy their best feature ↳ The market has already moved on ↳ You're solving last year's problems You chase vanity metrics ↳ You focus on competitor growth numbers ↳ You copy their pricing strategy blindly ↳ You ignore unit economics that actually matter You lose your unique edge ↳ You blend into the crowd ↳ You become a "me too" product ↳ Your USP becomes "we're slightly better" Here's what market leaders do instead: 👉 You study users, not competitors ↳ You talk to 5 potential customers weekly ↳ You focus on problems, not features ↳ You build what users need, not what competitors have 👉 You find the white space ↳ You look for what's missing in all solutions ↳ You identify shared blind spots ↳ That's your opportunity zone 👉 You challenge industry "truths" ↳ Every "best practice" is an opportunity ↳ Every "must-have" feature is questionable ↳ Every "that's how it's done" needs a "why?" 👉 You build for sustainability ↳ You focus on your own unit economics ↳ You design pricing around value, not competition ↳ You measure what matters to your business 👉 You double down on difference ↳ You amplify what makes you unique ↳ You turn industry "weaknesses" into strengths ↳ You make competitors irrelevant, not inferior Your next big product won't come from copying competitors. It'll come from seeing what everyone else missed. Stop studying your competition. Start questioning their assumptions. What industry "truth" in your market needs challenging?

Many marketers base their content strategy off of scrutinizing competitor content that ranks well, then crafting something similar. This approach seems logical but is fundamentally flawed. Why mimicking competitor content doesn’t cut it: ➡️ Best case scenario: You end up with content that slightly differentiates itself but still feels derivative and uninspired—safe, but not groundbreaking. ➡️ Worst case scenario: You risk allegations of plagiarism or, at the very least, damaging your brand’s reputation through a clear lack of innovation. Why chase the shadows of your competitors when you can harness the power of surveys to generate fresh, original content directly from the source—your audience. Here’s how you can use survey insights to not just compete with your competitors, but to stand out from your competitors: Gain a deep audience understanding: Tailor your content to what the data says your audiences care about and want to learn more about. Real-time feedback: Continuously refine your content topics based on your audience’s feedback. Trend identification: Stay ahead by aligning your content with emerging trends. Brand differentiation: Establish your brand as the authority in the industry, because you’re the one with the data. With a strategy rooted in authentic, original research, your content does more than just compete—it establishes your brand as a true thought leader. Don’t just compete—lead! #ThoughtLeadership #OriginalResearch

Blindly copying your competitors? “Our competitor is doing this, so we should too, right?” As product designers, we prioritize solving customer needs. But we are not the only ones addressing these needs. Other companies are also building products to target our customers. A lack of differentiation will just put you in a pricing war with your competitors. Here's how to implement an effective competitive differentiation strategy: 1️⃣ Know your customers - Identify who exactly your target customers are. - Research their needs, pain points, and preferences. - Uncover their exact requirements and expectations. 2️⃣ Understand your competition - Analyze your competitors' target audience, USPs, strengths, and weaknesses. - Scrutinize their product features, pricing strategies, UX & UI, and marketing tactics. - Spot gaps in their offerings where you can excel. 3️⃣ Develop unique differentiated value propositions - Focus on what the customer values, not just what you offer. - Take advantage of areas where competitors fall short. - Your value proposition should resonate with your customer's needs. 4️⃣ Integrate into your product marketing plan - Ensure every aspect of your marketing highlights your unique value. - Train your team to consistently communicate these differentiators. - The end goal is to position your product as the go-to solution in your niche. --- Regularly observe what competitors are doing. It helps you spot opportunities you can take advantage of. However, avoid simply copying without understanding why. _______________ Hi there, I'm Muskan! 👋 🌱 I help engineers break into design 📈 Book a call today to get started!

Don't fall into the copycat trap. A common mistake made in legal marketing is watching what competitors are doing, and then attempting to replicate their exact strategy. Here's the thing... What worked for your firm might not work for others. And on the flip side, what worked for other firms  might not work for yours. ❌ There are some markets where SEO is a losing bet ✅ In others, you can dominate with SEO ❌ For some firms, Google Ads are cost-prohibitive ✅ Others can't spend enough money on them ❌ Sometimes, a multi-site approach makes no sense ✅ Others, it's precisely what's needed to compete Every firm is unique - with its own goals, objectives, market conditions, competitive landscape, resources, and capital. These are the factors that should shape your marketing strategy. Ditch the one-size-fits-all approach and refuse to let the competition dictate your marketing playbook. Break the mold. What's one way you've differentiated your approach from the competition?