The Small vs. Big Problem
In an ideal world, businesses don't compete, they innovate and provide with different products; yet we are not living in this idea world and we never will. Under-funded startups are often forced to confront mighty topdogs.
How do we deal with that as the underdog?
1. Topdogs crush startups?
Startup founders in China are often asked question like this: “What would you do if the BAT copy and crush you?” (They don’t even bother to say “try to crush you” as if you are being crushed as they speak.) BAT stands for Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent, which are the Chinese Internet topdogs with the reputation of killing startups by copying startups’ business models.
Intimidating as they seem, contrary to the instinct of many people, the threat of getting crushed by these topdogs is more fear than fact. None of them has ever killed even one startup with original or unique product, business model and/or technologies. They crushed only copycats.
Douban started as a book review site back in 2005, and expanded to reviews on music and movie later. It might have borrowed design inspirations from Flickr, Douban is undoubtedly the most original Chinese internet service. There is nothing like it in the world.
Did BAT copy and crush Douban? Nope. Instead, Tencent has invested in it, because Tencent knew that it couldn’t crush Douban. Douban users are young hipsters who often pride themselves in taste of music, movie and lifestyle, while Tencent is more associated with its vulgar appetite to go after the most notorious copycat in China.
Do people use QQ and Wechat? Sure. Do people want to talk about music, movies and travels on Tencent possible take of Douban? Hell no, it is distasteful, even to hardcare Tencent fan boys.
2. Why shouldn’t you copy?
First, I assume you are a startup founder and you are small (by its very definition of startup.)
Peter Thiel is right, competition sucks, especially when you have a dozen identical twins and you are the smallest one. Picture yourself with Mike Tyson in the boxing ring. You don’t want to play that game, nobody does.
For a startup as the underdog, the best competition is no competition at all. By designing your own product, you set the standard and rules, by which you will win. You are the Mike Tyson in your little box ring. You are the one to punch on faces, not the other way around.
By copying product from other people, you get yourself into a game that Mike Tyson kills and you get killed.
Not to mention the risk that you are exposed to attacks from hundreds of your brother copycats.
Be different. It is lonely, but it is the only right way.
3. Fear not, think
Nobody can feel no fear when confronting a big guy like Mike Tyson in the boxing ring.
Our ancestors lived on African savannahs, where large predators such as lions roam around. We fear as human being. The instinct of fight or run is wired in our DNA. That is why we rely on instinct more often and skip the thinking part to stay alive.
Unfortunately, the run-away instinct is bad for business. In business, fear doesn’t help, think does. To think, we need to overcome our fear first.
4. How startups beat topdogs?
There are a couple of reasons that we can beat big companies or, topdogs as people commonly call them.
First, as startups, we are hungry.
Big companies are normally run by executives, not entrepreneurs, these dudes spend lots of time thinking of year-end bonus, holiday travels and worry about their mortgages, not what the world would be looking like in five or ten years. We do. When they have this much on their minds, they simply don’t have time to think about other things.
We are on our own, facing threat of death every single day. That makes us hungry and agile.
Second, we are more focused.
Big companies are distracted, simply because they have more options. It is like a lot of hot girls dying to go out with you, you would be struggling to decide which one you go out with. In the end, you might end up with the wrong girl instead of the right one.
We don’t have options, so we don’t have distractions. That forces us to get ourselves really focused.
We can choose our battle.
You can beat Mike Tyson in a million ways, what about Tyson fight with his favourite weapon, his fists and you use a M-16 rifle? Unfair? Exactly.
You may have heard of the Biblical story of David vs. Goliath, and you may think it is just pure luck. Not if David knew what he was going to do, and what was going to happen. According to Malcolm Gladwell, the bigger one is the weaker one:
David and Goliath is “a metaphor for improbable victories,” Gladwell explained during a Ted Talk in September. “Why do we call David an underdog? Well, we call him an underdog because he’s a kid, a little kid, and Goliath is this big, strong giant. We also call him an underdog because Goliath is an experienced warrior, and David is just a shepherd. But most importantly, we call him an underdog because Goliath is outfitted with all of this modern weaponry, this glittering coat of armor and a sword and a javelin and a spear, and all David has is this sling.”
The first mistake history has made when retelling the tale of David and Goliath is to assume that David was a helpless boy who only had a wimpy slingshot to protect himself, Gladwell said.
That’s because there were three types of warriors in ancient times: people who fought with slings and archery (David), foot soldiers who were good at up-close combat with swords (Goliath), and people on horseback.
Goliath was a foot soldier; David was a slinger. When put this way, and you note that Goliath and David were fighting from somewhat of a distance, it makes David’s weapon choice seem smart. He’s good at attacking with accuracy from afar.
It also makes you understand why Goliath was in trouble the moment David whipped out his sling. If David never got close to him, how could he attack and defeat him?
“Goliath is a sitting duck. He doesn’t have a chance,” Gladwell concludes.
Good startups should always fight like David, if a fight is inevitable.