Beat your competitors in tough times

Running a business is a tough competition that requires a lot of skills. Always keep an eye on your competitors, know what they are doing right or wrong, to stay ahead of the game.

Running a business is tougher than you think. It requires a lot of skills, foresight, and constant innovation with customers always on the lookout for new products or services. And in today’s digital age, words travel faster than we could imagine and so it’s always best to keep an eye on your competition.

First, identify your competitors and keep track of what they are doing and what they may be planning. But it goes beyond that. Finding and solving your shared market’s “pain points” is now part of the common equation.

How to do this? Conduct a survey to identify your company’s biggest obstacle to gth and your customers’ most common complaints. If you have this in focus, you’re most likely to put a finger on the reason for recent business or customer losses. Once that is done, the next step would be to attempt to resolve the issue. Remember that it is important to continuously try to come up with solutions to the customers’ “pain” even if it takes several phone calls, messages or loads of emails.

Niche marketing

Another way to beat the competition is by establishing a niche in the market by way of storytelling and specialization. Competing in a cded market leaves little room for gth – what with all of you trying to get piece from the same pie. Coming up with a really unique selling proposition (USP), bearing in mind that the more unique it is, the less room for competition there will be. This could be a specific industry sector or a focused niche market.

Next try to communicate these USPs through creative storytelling in blogs, emails, social media addressing this key sectors. This may take a while to bear fruit just like identifying and addressing pain points but it does work. So, don’t rush into things and instead take the time to plot your story and then regularly turn into content campaigns.

Competitive pricing

Having a competitive price point is also guaranteed to shake your competition. This would require a bit of intelligence work, or in business lingo, data-gathering. You would also need to identify your market segment – lower, middle or upper-tiered – to come up with a compatible price range.

Change is a must

Picture this: At a ball game like soccer or basketball, you don’t just stand in one corner and wait for the ball. You keep moving to get a chance for the ball. The same with running a business: You need to constantly change to get the attention of your market; break away from the monotony, think outside the cliched box. Customers loved excitement. It’s the added toppings on their pizza; the extra cheese on their burger.

Be the change. Pivot has been an oft-used phrase in 2020 but pivoting has helped to keep several businesses not just survive but thrive. Remember, your competitors are regularly innovating, and new entrants are disrupting the marketplace. Your business should innovate often and, in a manner, that the competition finds hard to imitate.

Customer service

We’ve earlier mentioned about building brand loyalty among customers. A way to do this is providing excitement; and this comes by way of memorable customer service. Hire customer service people who have a wholesome view of your brand; and yes, experts say that more often than not, finding the right people for the job is more important than (actually) filling those jobs. Hospitality is not the sole domain of hotels and restaurants. It is as universal as that sweet smile on your employees’ faces interacting with customers, patiently and courteously replying to queries.

The key likewise is in having continuous training with the end in view of raising customer satisfaction in a manner that satisfies their discerning qualities and discriminating taste.

Wrapping it up, outperforming the competition is all about outsmarting them by building a solid and happily satisfied customer base indulging themselves in your competitively-priced products and services handed over by a team of confident employees continuously going through customer-service training for better interaction.

This, in turn, develops brand loyalty that you need to keep them coming back, noting your innovations and excited about something new to experience on their return.