How makers stay productive

Copying 90% of an existing business with 10% unique spin is so underrated.

Same reason why there's 10 different brands of orange juice in the supermarket all containing the same fruit inside.

There's always more room in the market than we assume, and people like more choices.

Yet for some reason many don't do it out of personal ego or pride. Or worse: They go the other extreme and clone entire websites/apps.

That got me thinking:

I should put my money where my mouth is and do it.

But thinking through, I did try it before:

- One 90:10 product is Sheet2Bio. It's 90% similar to all the incumbents like Linktree and Bio.Link, but the 10% differentiation is just in the Google Sheets as CMS. But it didn't do quite so well, or at least I haven't yet found the right value proposition for it and distribution channel.
- Lifelog is totally a 90:10 product too. It's building off what 200wordsaday was, with an added spin around writing about goals.
- Keto List Singapore is a 90:10 spin from NomadList, where the 10% is the targeting for keto folks in Singapore. It performed average in the initial few years.
- Sweet Jam Sites is so obviously a 90:10 spin from the conventional web design agency, but targeted for JAMstack sites. It never quite took off.
- Outsprint Design is 90% a consultancy service at it's base, with just 10% differentiation on business model, pricing, offering, and was my very first business that did well.

Indeed now that I ran through my key products, most of them are copied! 90% copied. Some hits, most misses. But that's the nature of the game. Copying guarantees nothing, just speed to market and validated market.

Goes to show, it's so easy to start products by 90% copying. But being truly unique and standout is a lot harder than you think.

Though not that being unique it matters all that much...