Competing Games: How to Profit From Your Competition

What’s up guys Tim Ruswick here. I wanted to make a video today specifically to talk about win-win situations. Because this is something I see a lot and I made a video a while back about how competition is a good thing. But I don’t really think I got the point across. So I wanted to kind of make a video to drive that point home because I think a lot of people misunderstood how competition is useful. So let me tell you a story about a guy that I worked with in my marketing company.

(Video Transcriptions)

He had an information product business basically he would sell information products digital products coaching that kind of thing he was a life coach so he helped people through difficult times in their lives he helps them you know get accountable and do whatever they need to do in life. Great guy awesome guy. But he was terrified of this other guy that was doing similar stuff in the same business in the same location selling to the same people. And he had hired me to help him market and to help them solve the problem of his competitors.

And I immediately noticed that something was up. Like he had an unnecessary fear of competitors right. Like you but should be scared of people anytime he was like legit scared that this guy was gonna steal all his business. So the thing I actually recommended him do that it took a long time to convince him of this but I actually convinced him to call up the competitor and meet with them. And all three of us sat down and what we ended up devising that day was what’s called a joint venture. And this guy’s business tripled in six months because these two guys started working together.

And what what they realized that day that I’ve seen work a thousand times I’ve seen it in so many different facets of life is that a lot of people live in this scarcity mentality. They live in this concept that there is not enough to go around right. So in game development if you’re making a game and you see someone that has a similar game you’re like oh shit they’re made my game now I gotta quit. And I see this all the time like so many people are like oh I was working on this thing but then these guys came out with something similar so I quit or I was building this thing but you know it’s too similar to that so they stopped. What they don’t realize is that like a lot of times you are not competing for a finite amount finite piece of the pie.

The pie sometimes it’s infinite in the world. And like you got to understand that like just because someone is doing something similar doesn’t mean that they’re taking business away from you. You gotta look at it the other way which is the abundance mindset which is like they can give you business. You guys are targeting the same people you can work together. You can share customers. Because no one does the same thing in the same exact way right. Like everybody has their own unique thing to offer.

Like if you look on other youtubers there’s plenty of youtubers to talk about game development. But they all have they’ll do in their own way right. Like I do it my own way in weird stories about my life and marketing company and lots of cuss words. Like that’s that’s my way of doing it. And I realized early on like one of the first things that I did especially when I started YouTube channel I reached out to all the youtubers. I’m still reaching out to different people. I’m still trying to connect with people. Cuz I don’t view these people as competition right.

And like when I’m working on my game I don’t view other games that are similar in mine as competition. In fact I think that is the number one place where I can get players from. I have a game called Philophobia coming out in February. And one of the main strategies for that game is gonna actually be trying to get a hold of the creators of similar games and market out to their user base.

So I want you to understand that like competition is a good thing. Like not only from like not to rehash the whole Competition video but like if there’s competition one that means that there’s there’s a lot of demand for what you have. Which is a good thing it’s it’s validation of the market. It means that people want to buy what you have. But two any competitor the you that you see any similar game to yours any game that’s out there that looks similar keep in mind that that game can be a source of players for you.

You can you can see what they’re doing with the marketing you can see who’s playing the game you can go on Steam spy and see how else is doing or App Annie or whatever depending on the platform. You can look up the statistics. You can go you know you can reverse-engineer how they’re doing their website and all that. Like you can learn from this you can learn from this stuff. And you could target the youtubers and streamers that play that game.

You know what I mean like competition is actually a blessing because it gives you like an insight into how the market might react to what you’re creating which is a good thing. When you’re shooting completely in the dark and like some indie games try and go like crazy innovative which is awesome. But it also means it’s crazy risky right. And like if you want to build a business out of something like this you got to balance the risk with the reward. You can’t just like go straight in there.

And and competition is one of the ways to do that. If you have competition it means there’s an existing market and there’s demand for your product there’s a demand for your game. So it’s a good thing. And I want to talk about specifically like these win-win situations. Because if you see somebody similar to you or that has a game similar to yours you need to think and win-win. How can I win while he wins.

Because what a lot of people think is that in order for them to win the other guy’s gotta lose. Or in order for that guy to win I gotta lose. So just try and reframe your brain into thinking about how things actually work. It’s not win lose. You got to think in terms of win-win. You gotta think in terms of how can I succeed while helping this guy succeed. And a lot of people are scared to like make these connections and reach out.

And but like I’ve made so many connections in my life by just promoting someone’s stuff. Especially competitors man. Competitors like they freak out when you just promote their stuff. You say hey this was great article. Hey this was agreed whatever. And you’d be surprised. And not only that but like let’s say you’re building an audience on Twitter or something.

It’s hard to write all that content all day right. And if you have if there’s a game similar to yours that you know your audience will like. Push them to that game tell them to check it out. Tell them how awesome it is. It does not take away sales from you. It is not them winning and you losing. It’s win-win. You can build a relationship with these people. You can you know work some kind of thing out.

And I guarantee you if these people are human and they see you tweeting about their stuff. They’re probably going to return the favor. It happens all the time and it’s it’s it just bums me out because I see so many people that are afraid of competition. They’re afraid of what happens when someone creates something similar. And I just want to say to you that like there is more money out there than you could possibly imagine. There are more players out there than you could possibly imagine.

There’s there’s an unlimited amount of people you just have to find them. And competition is beautiful because it allows you to find them so much more easy easier you know. Like it’s just it’s right there. If someone makes a similar game of yours there’s your target market sitting right there. They’re all there they’re all on the steam reviews. They’re all on the email list. All in the you know they’re right there they’re in the Facebook group. Like just keep that in mind man.

And and don’t think in terms of like people having to lose for you to win. Like just understand that like everybody can win at the same time. And reach out to the people that have competing games right. Because you’re not really competing. Reach out to those people. Talk to them ask them if they learned anything. Tell them what you learned on the way. You know work with them. It’s just a better better way to live.

So weird message but it was on my mind and I wanted to share it so that’s all I got. If you have any comments on this please leave them below. I love to start a discussion about this stuff. What do you think about competition. Good bad evil tell me what you think below.

But until next time once again I’m Tim Ruswick see you guys then.