If your business is successful, people will try to copy what you do. It’s just a law of life. However, there is a great way to protect yourself from copycats: Makeсебя.Make your product or service unique by incorporating your distinctive way of thinking into what you sell. Create a custom fit. Offer something that no one else can provide.
Look at how the company Euroset operated under the leadership of Yevgeny Chichvarkin. They sold the same mobile phones as “Mobilochka,” “Allo,” “Astel,” or other retailers. However, Euroset set itself apart from them, thanks to the obsession of its owner. When Chichvarkin left, Euroset became just as ordinary a company as all the others.
Everyone remembers the outrageous strip contests, the borderline advertising posters, and the BTL girls outside mobile phone stores, as well as the official orders to staff presented as confidential letters with profanity; the blackmail of phone manufacturers (once, Chichvarkin set a zero commission for sellers on Samsung phones, then he stopped official purchases of Nokia through the Russian office).
His company was a market leader in retail sales of mobile phones, with 3,200 stores under the “Euroset” brand opened in Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus, and Kyrgyzstan. Chichvarkin always kept a close eye on new models himself. To determine what would be popular that year and what wouldn’t, he only needed an hour to walk through the pavilions of all the phone manufacturers at the international exhibition. Evgeny came up with the marketing campaigns himself. All the memorable advertising campaigns for “Euroset” were created with his direct involvement, as were many small advertising ideas. For example, symbolic signs hung on the door of “Euroset” stores: dogs allowed, ice cream allowed.
How much is “Euroset” as a company similar to its owner? In the case of Chichvarkin, it’s a complete, almost physiological merging of the businessman and his business. Provocation in the market and modesty in the office, dedication and democratic spirit, competition and strain. Middle managers imitate Chichvarkin, and at corporate parties, the salesgirls take photos with him as if he were a movie star.
At the same time, there is virtually no “barrier to entry” in the mobile phone market. Any interesting ideas are quickly copied. However, it is impossible to replicate Chichvarkin, and when he stepped away from Euroset, everything changed fundamentally.
Another example is the pub “At Eric’s,” which was located in the basements on Leo Tolstoy Square in Kyiv. It didn’t seem to be different from other establishments. They all sold beer and snacks, and many of them were situated in basements. However, Eric’s was always packed. Other restaurateurs could copy anything they wanted, except for Eric himself.
Immerse yourself in the product you are selling and everything that surrounds it: how you sell it, how you provide support, how you explain it, and how you deliver it. Competitors will never be able to replicate this.вас.in your product.
I have never been afraid of the dissemination of training materials prepared by the trainers of the companies whose sales I managed, simply because a copy of a presentation is not a copy of the trainer. You cannot replicate the trainer who conducts the training. The presentation itself can be copied, even if not literally, then figuratively—by attending the training and taking notes in a notebook. A person who fears that something will be stolen from them or used without permission is, first and foremost, revealing their own mediocrity.
P.S. I spent a long time finding similar examples from Ukrainian or Russian practice that would resonate with our readers. Therefore, I would be happy if readers leave comments with similar examples where the personality of the owner became part of the product.