The Bottom Line

Has imitation replaced innovation? I know the answer to that question, in general, is no. But the actions of too many supposed innovators out there have me dismayed.

I recently spoke with the CEO of a major sales training company. Let's call him Fred. I told Fred I was surprised that I hadn't seen anything new on his company's Web site. Fred said he stopped listing his company's new offerings because he "wants to stop educating his competitors." He feels they're lifting his material and passing it off as their own.

I feel his pain. In fact, I have firsthand knowledge that his company's intellectual property was being repackaged by other training companies.

A while back I audited a sales training class offered by one of Fred's competitors. Let's call the company PirateCo. The PirateCo. trainer provided clever anecdotes that were virtual copies, including hand movements, facial expressions, and verbal inflections, of those delivered in my presence by the founder of Fred's company some time before.

So ingrained was the imitation that the trainer serving up this material was just following PirateCo.'s standard curriculum, lifted from Fred's company back in the dark ages. Not only was he (and his company) merely imitating, but he and PirateCo. never even bothered to go beyond what was lifted and develop something new from it.

Now, back to Fred. Is he paranoid for wanting to hide what is his by not updating his Web site? Not necessarily. But PirateCo.'s blatant theft is forcing Fred to innovate to come up with more new products in order to keep PirateCo. on the run. And the thieves? By copying rather than innovating, PirateCo. is providing its customers with mere commodities, offering no differentiation as a rationale to buy its services based on anything else but price.

Here is a personal experience of a form of identity theft. I've written dozens of articles as a component of my marketing strategy. Now and then I'd find someone republishing my copyrighted material without attribution. When I would call them on it, in every case (except one) they would apologize, relent, and either remove the article or list me as the author.

One well-connected sales and marketing consultant has a Web site with dozens of articles that he represents as his own. He has deliberately stripped off bylines and copyright notices. I'm sure of that, since one of the articles on his site is mine. He evidently opted in to my mailing list, figuring on using my e-newsletter as a new source of content for his own site.

When I contacted him, he stonewalled me. "We're redoing our site next quarter and I'll fix it then," he shamelessly answered. In the meantime, many business Web sites were linking to articles on his own site, providing them much wider distribution. And of course, the originality of content is being attributed to him. I would expect he is delighted by this Web proliferation; he gets an unexpected dividend for his original, larcenous efforts.

So, what about us innovators? Should we stop creating and just copy, too? Should we have to hide what we do create, like my friend Fred? Should we spend our precious resources taking legal action when our copyrights are infringed upon? Or should we steer innovation in a different direction by figuring out creative ways to expose the pirates?

First, I'm committed to creating differentiated products and services so I can't become commoditized. Then, if I'm innovative enough in marketing and selling them, I'll win. And that will be the best revenge.