Copy Cat, Dirty Rat?

The internet is designed to share information. Millions of pages of content are available at the click of a mouse and countless links are shared freely via Twitter, Facebook and other social networking sites. Many pages encourage sharing via the use of Share Widgets or people just use copy and paste.

When information is so readily available the lines can become blurred about ownership of web content and information. It’s easy to forget that those words belong to someone and in many cases are copyright to the author.

After operating our online business for just over eighteen months we’ve had three separate incidents that we know of, where other websites have “borrowed” either our website copy or images. In one case, the company badly photo-shopped the Belly Beyond packaging out of one of our product shots, so they were certainly aware they were our images (as opposed to the manufacturers).

We know how easy it is to make the mistake. In the very early days of Belly Beyond, a similar error was made in setting up product text on our website. Text was used from a site other than the manufacturers which included personalised sentences being added here and there to the manufacturer’s standard text. In due course, we quite rightly received an email from the author, and then another hours later when further indiscretions were found, requesting their text be removed immediately. We amended the text and telephoned the company straight away to apologise personally.

We’ve since heard of many other companies who have had it happen to them and the majority certainly say it seemed to be out of ignorance rather than anything malevolent. So based on that, here are our recommendations from both sides of the fence.

1. Starting Out

a. Make sure any content and images you source are directly from the manufacturer or distributors themselves or a URL that they provide you. We check with each supplier every time we add a new product that images and content are available for us to use.

b. Take the time to write your own copy or in the least personalise it.

c. Do not use another site’s text or images. They belong to them and apart from possible copyright breaches, it’s just plain rude.

2. What to do if you’ve been copied

a. Take a screenshot. Then you have your own copy of the content in question.

b. Contact the company or person by email. Be professional and request politely but firmly that they remove the content that belongs to you.

c. Give them a reasonable amount of time to reply and rectify. In all the cases we’ve dealt with, the companies in question were apologetic and embarrassed and removed the content straight away and we trust that there won’t be another occasion to contact them.

If the company refuses contact or removal of the content, then get in touch with your lawyer.

At the end of the day you need to put it into perspective. Is it the end of the world that this has happened? If it’s a minor indiscretion then how much time and energy are you going to put into it?

3. What not to do if you’ve been copied:

The company who contacted us about incorrect text on our site has taken a totally different approach. As far as we can tell here is their step-by-step guide and I’m pretty confident they won’t mind us not giving them a credit for their actions in this case:

a. Set up customer accounts under false names on the competitors website
b. Ask for free samples of product
c. Place numerous fake orders, either then ignore the correspondence that follows or send false complaints about the service
d. Send fabricated complaints to joint suppliers
e. Email joint acquaintances about how awful the company is and how undeserving of their success
f. Set up yet more false user accounts and join the competitors Facebook page and spam with mischievous comments and your own website link
g. Use the false names to publish made up reviews about your company

While your first instinct to being copied might be a negative one, remember that just like any other action you take in business, how you choose to deal with the situation will reflect on you and your business as a whole.

Note: if you have been the target of similar tactics, in any industry or to any extent, please get in touch for more info on our support group “Business Against Bullying”. Your correspondence will be treated with the utmost confidence. info@bellybeyond.co.nz

Have you ever tried to ride a snow ball?

Things are going so amazingly well here at Belly Beyond HQ and the momentum we are gathering seems to be taking on a life of its own.

With some cheeky PR from yours truly and on the back of the Her Business Woman of the Year Awards, we have a TV crew due here tomorrow, a photographer coming Friday for some Lifestyle shots, more awards announcements due Friday, TV appearance on Monday, 'nother one in the planning in August, full page magazine ad (for a fraction of full cost), a Mentor match, a Charity Partnership..... I could go on.

I think we are getting a feel for what it's like to ride a snow ball - and I have everything crossed we don't end up flattened by it! But unlike any other venture I've ever undertaken, everything we try to achieve seems to fall into place easily. That's not to say we don't face challenges. We do on a daily basis, but those challenges seem more like potholes or judder bars - things you get over fairly unscathed with a keener eye on the road ahead.

Well this is a rather deep post from me. So that said, back I go to the shallow end of Blogland.

Mothers Day means it's Belly Beyonds Birthday!

Wow, how can a year have gone past already? This pic of Heidi and I is taken on Day 1 of Belly Beyond and when we launched on Mothers Day 2008, we certainly had high hopes - we'd done the market research, we were committed to superier customer service and we thought we had a good mix of products.

But really we were holding our breath, crossing our fingers and just taking a huge leap into the unknown.

To give you some idea of the growth we've had over the past 12 months, in the last 2 months we've processed some 800 orders. This is the same amount that we processed for the whole of May-December 2008!

We've learnt valuable lessons too numerous to count and we've made some really lovely friends among both our suppliers and our customers.

We've got 2 brand new sections being added as we speak, with a beautiful range of 100% certified organic products for your wee ones as well as our My Room section which we plan to focus on in the coming months. If you know of any must haves please drop us a line of info@bellybeyond.co.nz and we'll do what we do to get it in for you at the best possible price!

Our crazy Belly Beyond member only offer this week was a fantastic success so congrats to all you clever cookies who got 70% off your Nappy Bag - pays to be on the Belly Beyond mailing list then!

So whats been our best sellers over the last year?

1) HOTmilk
2) ERGObaby carriers
3) Isoki Reversible Baby Bags

THANKS SO MUCH FOR ALL YOUR SUPPORT.