Copycat Websites: Why Your Business Deserves Better Than a Digital Clone

Ever walked into a party wearing the same outfit as someone else? Now imagine that outfit cost you $30,000 and it didn’t even fit.
That’s what it's like when businesses copy websites that look successful on the surface. What they don’t see is the scaffolding - huge marketing budgets, backend teams, and years of experimentation holding that polished façade together.

Dangerous Assumptions of Website Cloning

A Design that Is Optimised for Conversion

Cloning someone else's website, assuming that they've done the 'split testing' and have built what works, is a major mis-step.

In the decades that Conversion Leadership has worked with companies and individuals building online infrastructure - websites, platforms, automation and integration (hundreds if not thousands of websites), only on two occasions did a website owner specifically request split testing be done to improve conversion rate. In all other cases our team undertook A-B testing, optimisation and conversion rate tweaking as part of our management programs.

Few businesses or individuals have the time or budget for conversion rate optimisation and testing of their website, so you may be cloning a website that looks gorgeous but doesn't work.

A Shortcut to Being Business Ready

Cloning a website without considering whether or not the website supports a business that is at the same growth stage as you (what you need as a beginner in business is completely different to what an established brand company needs) can be a big problem.

A website with all the 'bells and whistles' built, optimised and expanded over years can be copied at great expense, but if you don't have the skills, staff and expertise to run the backend business for the website, the outcome is going to be difficult.

Will Get Me The Same Types of Clients

Cloning a website in the hope that you'll attract the same type of target audience can seem like a great shortcut. However there is more involved in targeting a particular audience that what pages the website has. For example, high net worth individuals require very different communication and content than budget conscious families. Which means your content marketing and sales teams need to be aligned to your website (rather than the other way around - which is more usual).

Most people are surprised to discover that the colours, the fonts and the way information is presented all convey meaning that people pick up subconsciously to help them instantly decide whether they can afford to investigate further (without viewing a single video or reading a word of a webpage).

Even a single word makes a difference on a button. For example the word 'join' is collegiate in nature, it's chummy and down-to-earth. The word 'invite' on the other hand is singularly exclusive, it conveys specialness and personalisation. While the word 'subscribe' is instructional.

Just know, that as soon as you start tinkering with your clone to make it more your own, you will change in subtle ways the target audience appeal.

My Version Will Be Even Better

A website is a mirror of the culture and people behind it. Built into the website are their values and beliefs which may not reflect your own... and these values and beliefs get 'baked into' the architecture of the website.

It is a common misunderstanding that by simply changing the content you make a clone website your own. However, the way a shopping cart works, when and how people are interrupted with pop-up forms, an emphasis on social media and other off site links are all part of the culture and values of a website owner that get built in.

Blindly copying these things and then later recognising that they are not how you want to engage with your visitors is very expensive to change (usually requiring a completely new website to be built).

So before you duplicate another slick site, ask yourself:
Am I copying the style or the substance? And is either actually what I need right now?
Spoiler: The answer is probably no.