Ask HN: Someone has already launched with the same idea. Should I still launch? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Someone has already launched with the same idea. Should I still launch?

11 pointsHNburner12314 comments

I had been looking into starting a company to do X. Along the way I kept running into the issue of Y and realized that Y might be a better problem to tackle. I had the idea to build an API-centric solution, essentially a "Stripe for Y". I think it could be a bigger market and plays better to my strengths, rather than the original idea to do X.

The only issue is that I found that someone else launched essentially that exact idea a few months ago. They are not yet at general availability, but have raised a good bit of money from brand name investors and seem to have early customers. Overall they appear to have a more mature version of the idea.

My question is then: Should I still pursue this startup idea?

I do think that this will be a large, growing market, but at the moment I have no specific ideas that would differentiate me from the existing company.

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> The only issue is that I found that someone else launched essentially that exact idea a few months ago. They are not yet at general availability

If it's not GA, it's not really launched.

Anyway, first mover advantage is BS. Apple was late to smart phones, Android was even later. Google was late to search and advertising. Playstation and Xbox were very late to the console market; even Nintendo was late and they showed up to a dead market. Spotify was late to music. Etc, etc, etc.

There's certainly some benefit to being in a new market early, but being a fast follower is often easier than breaking new ground.

Like someone else said, this is validation that your idea has legs! You can proceed knowing that at least someone thinks there's money in this space.

Consider competitors like Stripe/Square, Uber/Lyft, Instacart/Shipt, NewRelic/Datadog/AppDynamics/Sentry, or even the sheer number of burger joints in your city. You are not automatically screwed because someone else had a similar idea!

Further consider that even if you had a totally unique idea, someone else could just copy it for the same reasons as above! "Did you see HNBurner123's new startup? It's a great idea. I bet we could do something similar even faster." Not to discourage you or anything with that thought, but it's a fact of life -- and you shouldn't let it stop you! Why would anyone create Facebook if Myspace is already a thing?? Or Reddit if Digg is a thing? Do you know how many "create a Trello-clone in 30 minutes" tutorials there are out there? But every day a new kanban board app launches, and people make money off of these things! There's a GAZILLION invoicing software apps that make money.

Look, ideas are a dime a dozen, and they are very rarely as unique as you think they are. Execution is the key to success, and getting to market fast is important too. So don't dilly-dally! Take your idea and SPRINT with it across the finish line! You're on the right track! We're rooting for you.

Consider yourself lucky!

You have a strong evidence that your idea worth something and caused someone’s interest besides friends&fools.

It seems for every problem there's already multiple solutions, and some by the biggest companies (AWS, Google) even. You can still find your niche. For example if they charge by request, you charge per month or vice versa. Not necessarily be cheaper, just have a different pricing model. Some customers prefer one, some the other. Some want the big-enterprise-unlimited-scalability wording on the website, others might prefer the same but packaged in simpler terms targeted at small companies or startups.

If anything the competitor with VC money has proven there is a market. They might be able to put in more money but they already have more aggressive goals and target they have to meet every quarter. That can mean they will start to add a lot of features, get distracted, hire too many people, pivot, run out money, get acquired (and later change the product or make it worse).

> My question is then: Should I still pursue this startup idea?

No reason not to, unless you have reason to believe this is a market with such strong network effects that a pile of VC cash is the only way to play a winner-take-all game.

> I do think that this will be a large, growing market, but at the moment I have no specific ideas that would differentiate me from the existing company.

Well, that's a bit more of a problem, you need to differentiate somehow, whether by pricing model, distribution, targeted customer segment, etc., but you can use a fast-follower strategy to copy the things they've done that work (and would work for you) so your efforts are more focused.

As a last resort, you can differentiate with branding and your Unique Selling Proposition (eg. otherwise highly similar products like toothpaste can be positioned as 'freshens breath', 'fights cavities', or 'whitens teeth').

The easiest trap to fall into is "like X, but cheaper", unless you have some real way of maintaining a pricing edge (eg. a simpler self-serve product, with less need for customer support), structural reasons for lower CAC (eg. targeting small business instead of 'enterprise' customers), etc.

There's no such thing as a unique idea. If people don't attempt things that have already been done, nothing moves forward.

You don't have to offer something that the other company doesn't. You don't even have to be "better" or bigger. You can offer the same thing slightly differently and people might pick you.

It's worth a shot, I say go for it.

Definitely. I'm working on something where a competitor is about half a year ahead, and I can clearly identify what parts of the app that others are using, and which parts are being ignored. To my surprise, one of the main features I thought my product would be good for went basically unused.

What the user wants is rarely the features, but some kind of solution. The solution isn't so clear from the feature. A primary feature of the iPhone is prestige, not calls, so looking good, being expensive, having a powerful camera is often more important than running smoothly or long battery life.

You can observe the competitor to see how people use it, read their reviews, see what people expect from it but aren't getting. Then make a better solution.

I'd also recommend getting to know your competitors well. If your product or their product fails, you could always work together.

I say do it. Competition can be good. Maybe they'll buy you out. This is all wild conjecture on my part. I have no experience in any of this.

Go ahead. Copy them while doing it better.

To consider: do they have more resources than you at the moment? It can be very hard to do something better than others if they have more resources than you (e.g., time, money, people)... but sure, it's not impossible.

If you're passionate about it, and people are willing to pay you for it, I don't see why you wouldn't.

(Disclaimer: I'm the founder of the 191st competitor to Pingdom, and it's profitable)

What's the idea btw? If you just found 1 competitor it may mean you just didn't do very good research :)

Go ahead. focus on your product and don't let other's product distract you.

Of course you should. There is competition in every space, as there should be.

Even your aesthetics can differentiate you.

Yes!

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