Level playing field be damed.
You have the wrong analogy.
This isn't a game, it's Business.
Is a battle-field ever level?
That said, if i had competitors that tough, i'd sell something else.
If you wanna see skewd search results... look at eSad's ...i mean eBay's "best match" search results.
"The second point to recognise is that given the above your sales offerings on the internet need to be on websites where the buyers are. No amount of juggling around with listing positions will change sales volumes from new customers substantially if you are trying to promote on sites where there is insufficient visitor traffic. ..."
As i said in another thread:
"You get what you pay for"
"sometimes you gotta spend money to make money"
And "Brains"
(i am what is known around here as a zombie seller)