Amy Isaman
You know you’ve got a good idea when your ideas are all of a sudden everywhere!
Two things happened this week that made me think about ideas and originality and how we can have the SAME idea as someone else, the SAME business, and offer the SAME service AND we can do it in our own creative and unique ways.
If you want to sell something or offer a service, the idea that others in your space are selling or offering similar products or services is NOT a sign that you’re entering a super-saturated, crazy competitive market.
It’s a sign that there are buyers for whatever you’re selling...which is GREAT.
Let me share three examples as to how you know when you’ve got a GREAT idea:
Example #1 – Similar sales process which means market/idea validation
Two weeks ago, I started offering live, free website reviews on my website. People can share their email and sign up for a session. I’ve done monthly live webinars in the past, but I’d never been able to figure out how to make an ongoing live session work.
Then, a month ago, I actually found a woman who did weekly live sessions to build her business, though she does energy readings and not web reviews. Her process to hold space for these sessions was SO cool. I realized that this process could work in my business.
So, I launched my weekly live web review sessions, and they’ve been so much fun.
I was so grateful to learn of a process to create this, but I made it totally my own.
Our content and even some of the steps clients take are totally different, but sometimes the offers businesses make are the same which is also market validation.
Example #2 – Similar service/offer which means market/idea validation
This morning, I got an email from a bestselling author who does branding and messaging. The headline of his email was “Free Website Review?”
Wait, WHAT?!? That’s exactly what I’m doing.
His email copy read, “I’ll be hand-selecting a few websites for a live critique. Maybe I’ll choose yours!”
Now, did this multi-million dollar branding biz owner steal my idea?
Obviously not.
For me, this is validation of my web review offer. If a super successful branding dude is doing what I’m doing…awesome! Let’s have a happy dance!
He will bring his energy, skills, and knowledge to his web review session, and I will bring mine. We’ve each created OUR OWN CONTENT based on an (apparently) common idea.
Ideas are out there. The key is grabbing them when they hit you and making them YOUR own, with YOUR brilliance, for YOUR market.
Example #3 – Offers, services, and content that have been TOTALLY COPIED AND PLAGIARIZED
There’s another way to know you’ve got a good offer. Sleazy, creepy people do actually STEAL it.
Earlier this week, I got a message from a client. Her emotions were running rampant from disbelief to anger to frustration to feeling super violated.
Why?
Because it had been brought to her attention that not one but TWO people in her industry had copied her website word for word and used her content on their websites. One had also been copying all of her social media posts.
One of the thieves even failed to change a link, and the link to fill in a consult form actually went to my client’s site, which is actually kind of funny. Karma at work right there!
My client had worked SO hard on the content for her website. We’d worked together on it when we launched, and after a year of growing her business, she hired a sales coach who helped her revise and clarify her message further.
In this case, both of the thieves are in the same industry but failed to trust themselves enough to create their own content or messaging.
This is lazy. It’s illegal. And they now have 48 hours to completely update their websites OR their hosts AND Google will be contacted for copyright violations.
My client discovered that her content and ideas are SO good that people are copying her.
On the one hand, it’s validation that she’s amazing, but on the other hand, it sucks! It’s taken so much time and emotional energy to deal with.
So there are several ways to know when you’ve got a kick-ass idea:
1) other brilliant entrepreneurs are selling and creating similar ideas or using similar processes, and you’re all doing it (and succeeding) with your own creativity, energy, style, and content
2) lazy thieving entrepreneurs (who don’t trust their own creativity and value) steal your stuff
Hopefully, you’ve never had to worry about content theft, but if it is a concern of yours (because you’re so great and people copy your brilliance), you can install one of the following plugins to help:
Here’s to embracing your own brilliance and creativity in your business and implementing ideas in YOUR own original way.
In the comments, I’d love to hear your thoughts on the line of getting/finding inspiration vs. copying/stealing in your business.
xo,
Amy
Amy Isaman
