Competing Against Yourself For A Bigger Marketshare
By Gauher Chaudhry

This scenario all to often happens...

A company or individual develops and markets a new product or service that takes the world by storm. Orders start pouring in and everyone is thrilled with the results. Then all of a sudden there is a large drop in sales?

Why? Because a knock-off of that product or service has emerged onto the market at a lower price.

One prime example is the fitness product "SoloFlex" that used to be advertised in the form of infomercials on late night television. This fitness product was unique because they used rubber to form resistance rather than weights.

Once the product or service is deemed to be a success, pretty soon knock off products emerged such as BowFlex, NordicFlex, etc... and they took a nice chunk out of SoloFlex's profits.

How does a good marketer compete against these marketing conditions? They introduce a knock-off of their own product onto the market.

This helps the company or individual dominate the market and makes it harder for other companies to compete with a similar product.

Some people might not think that it makes sense because the company or individual will be taking orders away from their first product. But it may work in the companies favour.

Let me explain.

For example, lets assume you have developed a new invention that cleans carpets in only five minutes. Your product receives rave reviews and has become a huge hit. When you introduce a knock- off product that does that same thing your are also increasing brand awareness for the invention.

When brand awareness increases, so do orders. So in some cases, introducing a knock-off product could even increase your sales. A customer faced with only one ad may not be tempted enough to purchase the product. But when faced with two or three competing ads, will increase the chances of the customer purchasing.

Of course the negative factors of introducing a knock-off product is that it can be quite costly. Also the advertising costs or the knock-off product may not be entirely recouped.

A lot of research and profit analysis should be done before a decision to launch a knock-off product is made. But if you have a developed a product or service that can be easily copied, developing a knock-off version might be your only alternative to maintaining your market share.

Copyright © by Gauher Chaudhry

Gauher Chaudhry is editor of Cool Cash Ezine. You can subscribe by sending an email to subscribe@freecoolcash.com with "sub-art" in the subject. Join Gauher's two-tier affiliate program by promoting his latest book "EZ Money With Ezines." Gauher teaches individuals how to make thousands of dollars in the ezine publishing business! http://www.ezmoneywithezines.com

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