Daily Thought 33 - What stops someone else from doing what you’re doing?

When evaluating a business, one of the first questions an investor or investigator might ask involves the barrier to entry.  If the thing you are proposing is such a great idea, and it’s reasonably achievable, then why are the big guys not doing it already?  Or, what keeps competition from creeping up and saturating your market?  This kind of push back is reasonable, however, often simplistic.  Just because the barrier to entry for a particular business is low does not mean millions will start one tomorrow.  Knowledge about the existence of a particular business, or rather the lack of knowledge, can often stand as the greatest, invisible barrier.  Once you are in-the-know, where everything seems obvious, you may falsely assume what you now know is apparent to everyone; meanwhile, just moments ago, you were completely unaware of the business yourself.  This should serve as encouragement to a would be entrepreneur; if a business you knew nothing about months ago has now morphed into something of blatant simplicity in your eyes, then maybe you should pursue it; simplicity does not always suggest easy competition, but rather an elevated level of understanding.