I teach branding in a small design school here where I live. My students ask me a very similar question all the time and I always throw back the question to them:
How many toothpaste brands can you buy at the super market? And national wide? Or worldwide? How many toothpaste brands exist worldwide?
So yes, if you have an idea even if you start first, you are going to have some kind of competition. Those who can't understand this, just pay atention next time in a supermarket shelf and count different brands of the same product. Apps aren't any different. It's about solving a necesity or creating it.
This is sometimes true, but it really depends on the app. How many successful snapchats exist? How many successful Facebooks? The software world can be (not must be) different.
Myspace is dead, because Facebook did it better. On the other side of the coin even Google failed to dethrone FB with basically unlimited capital on their side. Sometimes your competitor is too big/popular to fail.
Also, we can apply this to other industries. What I love about your comment is precisely that you pointed a big problem for starting companies or launching products. You can't pretend to launch the next Facebook without the necessary resources to fight you in, or a very well planned strategy. It's a matter of common sense and reality, and a lot more complex than just developing a product. We all would be millionaire!
I teach branding in a small design school here where I live. My students ask me a very similar question all the time and I always throw back the question to them:
How many toothpaste brands can you buy at the super market? And national wide? Or worldwide? How many toothpaste brands exist worldwide?So yes, if you have an idea even if you start first, you are going to have some kind of competition. Those who can't understand this, just pay atention next time in a supermarket shelf and count different brands of the same product. Apps aren't any different. It's about solving a necesity or creating it.
This is sometimes true, but it really depends on the app. How many successful snapchats exist? How many successful Facebooks? The software world can be (not must be) different.
Myspace is dead, because Facebook did it better. On the other side of the coin even Google failed to dethrone FB with basically unlimited capital on their side. Sometimes your competitor is too big/popular to fail.
Agree! Yes I missed that part in my comment and you are 110% right!
Also, we can apply this to other industries. What I love about your comment is precisely that you pointed a big problem for starting companies or launching products. You can't pretend to launch the next Facebook without the necessary resources to fight you in, or a very well planned strategy. It's a matter of common sense and reality, and a lot more complex than just developing a product. We all would be millionaire!
Thankyou for bringing this up!
This.
You can make a todo app nobody has ever heard of that pays rent. You can make two & self compete.
It's not winner takes all.