Spies!

[Ozzy47]

Some people will go to great measures to find out what their competition is up to, even resorting to spying on your site! 😱

Have people from competing websites ever joined your site just to spy and see what your doing? Do they ever post or interact on the site or are they lurking only? Do you do anything about this sort of thing or do you allow it to happen? 🤷‍♂️

Have you ever done this sort of thing yourself? If so were you a active poster or just a lurker? 🍿

 

[Allan]

I would most just lurk that I have noticed, I have had someone try and images a long time ago.

 

[Katrina]

I used to lurk on a competitor's forum to see how he was doing since he opened up his Christian forum the same time Christianity Haven was opened up. He did so much better than we did at first but then he made some major change that ruined the concept and now it's no longer in existence.

 

[Nomad]

My forums are small and I know where my members come from. But I think sping is a good strategy to check on your competitor.

 

[Nebulous]

There is no competition, there is room for all of us. If our members want to hop around from board to board, more power to them!

 

[Page]

I don't see any spies, My place is so damn small and there is no reasons or point for spies to do their things.

 

[Deleted member 4320]

I’m always spying to find out all of that super secret information 🕵️‍♂️

The eagle has landed…

 

[fords8]

There is no competition, there is room for all of us. If our members want to hop around from board to board, more power to them!

Have to agree with @Nebulous on this. I am a member on his site and @Ash . Toss up a few posts on each site. I was not keeping up with it, but I am back doing it.

When I 1st started Peak Forum back up, I got emails/PMs from people about joining forces with @Ash . If I would ever do that and so on. They did stop. Now that @Nebulous has restarted his forum, they started back up again. They will stop soon I am sure.

 

[Gh0st4unt3r]

All website owners look at other sites see how things work and what could make our own sites better or do things that others are not doing and what things may work and may not work so we all learn from other sites and with most the internet being public for the most part its easy to get good ideas and ways that will or wont work for a website. i have myself checked out competition see how they work things to ensure i dont make mistakes similar to other sites and see what works well, see if i can change it up and make it better.

the web is a massive learning curve and has a wealth of knowledge now compared to many years ago, and as @Nebulous says there is room for lots more and many new ideas and innovations to come 🙂

 

[TheRedAngel]

It would only be a problem if the spy was either stealing code or ping members there. Most of the time it's just friendly competition.

 

[Uncrowned Guard]

Tracking competitors and taking ideas from others is basically how we got the advanced software and successful forums of today. Stealing is wrong, but education and awareness are how things progress, sadly which means the original holder of the idea may end up a loser at times. Business is business and even the smallest community should be doing everything it can to succeed.

 

[Shawn Gossman]

I constantly spy on my competition.

Sometimes that might mean joining their community as a member and seeing what they're up to.

This has always been a recommended practice in digital marketing and competitive analysis. I don't see anything wrong with it at all, myself.

What is wrong is when you copy things without making them your own. You steal things. That is where I draw the line.

I try to make it really easy for my competition to see how I do things. Everything I do to make my blogs, communities, and brand better - I post articles about on my blog because that's what the niche of the blog is, haha.

I want my success to work for you if you want to use it.

So, yes, spying on your competition, IMO, is a good marketing practice.