DDG may not be the best example depending on the field you're in - they use their competitors to provide a lot of their service and get their competitors to do it for free it seems. There aren't too many spaces where you can do that.
There's an aphorism that says "the second mouse gets the cheese" which I think means that coming second you can let the forerunner make the mistakes and learn from what they get wrong. This has a lot of mileage IMO.
Anecdote: When my partner and I started in business in a very fine niche, a largely new thing in our country, a competitor opened in our town within a km of us between us securing premises and opening them. Thankfully they determined for personal reasons they couldn't continue and left us with some extra customers ... don't pin your hopes on your competitions CEO getting pregnant though!
There's an aphorism that says "the second mouse gets the cheese" which I think means that coming second you can let the forerunner make the mistakes and learn from what they get wrong. This has a lot of mileage IMO.
Anecdote: When my partner and I started in business in a very fine niche, a largely new thing in our country, a competitor opened in our town within a km of us between us securing premises and opening them. Thankfully they determined for personal reasons they couldn't continue and left us with some extra customers ... don't pin your hopes on your competitions CEO getting pregnant though!