Facebook Wants To Be Amazon, Amazon Wants To Be Google…

…And everyone wants to be Apple.

On July 15, Facebook signaled a major change concerning its business pages. For the past year, Facebook has been experimenting with a “Buy” button, and this July certain stores now have the new feature integrated into their business’ Facebook Page. The move would allow Facebook users to purchase items like clothing within Facebook, transforming the social network giant into a commerce site with the click of a button. Since 37% of customers are more likely to buy from a mobile-optimized site, Facebook thinks they will have a head start in this new arena.

Meanwhile, Amazon rolled out Cloud Drive this month, their mobile cloud-based storage apps for Android and iOS. Experts say that Cloud Drive is Amazon’s attempt to compete with Google Drive, as well as services like Dropbox. Early reviews of Amazon’s cloud service were mixed, but tech writers agreed that it was a Web development to watch, as Amazon is expected to offer more services to directly compete with Google in the coming years.

And then there’s current King-of-the-digital-Hill, Apple, which is moving in on Spotify’s turf with a free three-month preview of its new streaming music service. So, what do web development experts say we can learn from all this aggressive new competition?

This might seem counter-intuitive, but the lesson is to do the opposite of these Silicon Valley giants. Although the time may come when your company or website needs to “pivot” towards a new business model, most small businesses succeed and become large businesses by focusing on their core business, not experimenting with new ones.

Tech giants like Facebook, Google, and Apple might be able to afford to drop eight or nine figures monthly on experimental Web development projects, testing out new Web services and hiring a small army of website designers. But unless you have several billion squirreled away in foreign bank accounts somewhere, there’s no reason to waste precious time, money, and resources changing your business model.

Focus on what your company does best, and then focus on doing it better. Your company would probably be much better off investing your digital capital in social media or SEO services to find new customers, rather than building an entirely new commerce model from scratch. Remember: 61% of Internet users research products and services online, while 47% will abandon a website that doesn’t load in two seconds or less. Our conclusion: focus on the online basics before trying to experiment.