PREPARING FOR COMPETITION IN BUSINESS

Competition in business is inevitable. Every and all businesses will, sooner or later, have to deal with competition and that is a fact of business life. How do we prepare to deal with competition then?

Well, if the surveys are correct, most businesses do nothing to prepare for competition and in fact know every little about their competitors. Some businesses, through more luck than judgment, survive this lack of knowledge, others unfortunately do not. I would not recommend knowing nothing about your competition! Knowledge is strength.

The answer to competition in business is to start early in your preparations to understanding and meeting the challenge of competitors. Starting early means, researching your potential and possible competitors, before you even go into business. In fact your research findings should be included as part of your business plan.

If you are already in business it is never too late to start researching your competition in business.

If you don’t know your competitors you are going to loose market share as well as your customers, so it is well worth while investing time in researching your competition.

Before we take a look at the ways and means of researching your competition, it might be an idea to try and define what we mean by competition.

Defining the Competition

The sum total of any business competition can usually be broken down into two groups. The first group will be those competitors who use similar marketing, advertising, manufacture similar products or use similar skills to your intended business. For example, Coca Cola and Pepsi are competitors within the beverage industry.

The other side of the coin is that group of competitors who will be expected to also supply to customers from within the industry. Anyone who also sells drinks, so taking potential customers away from Coca Cola or Pepsi, are also competitors of both. All competitors in the first group are competing for the customer’s dollar in the second group.

Always bear in mind both competition groups and plan how to overcome the first and attract the customers of the second.

Researching the competition

“Know thy enemy”

Before going into business, it is always a lot easier to tell yourself that you have a winner and can’t go wrong, than it is to do the research to prove it! But doing the research is essential if you are to be prepared for competition.

You can do it and here’s how:-

• Who is your competition in business? List all possible competitors both from with the strategic group and from the customer group. Are you competitor’s local, national or even international? Are there likely to be greater numbers of competitors in the future?
• Visit them, buy from them and phone them. Are they doing a good job with good products? What services do they offer? When talking to their employees find out as much as you can.
• Ask their customers for a recommendation; are they happy with your competitor’s services?
• Read anything and everything you can about them in newspapers, trade magazines, at libraries, from annual reports.
• Use the Web. Check out their Web sites; search the Web for information on your competitors.
• Subscribe to newspapers in your competitors home towns. These are often the first to make public new information about your competitor. Also if they have email or other mailing lists, get subscribed.
• Attend trade shows, media events and any other events where you can expect to pick up information about your competitors.
• If you are already in competition in business, ask your customers what they think of your competition. Do they buy from them and why? Is there any price competition?
• Governments, universities, radio stations, standards associations all carry out business surveys. Many will cover your competitors so you can learn from them at little or no cost.
• Market research companies, competitive intelligence services and much software are all available to help you investigate your competition. Media monitoring services that automatically track keywords in broadcast, online and print media are a good and inexpensive way to gather information.

All, any or some of the above, can be used to prepare to ‘know they enemy’ and help prepare yourself for the competition in business.

Information is King when it comes to knowing your competition.

Conclusion

Don’t go into business blind. Plan to know your business competition, where they are, who they are and how well or not they are doing.

Understand their possible threat to your business, their strengths and their weaknesses. What are they doing that might offer opportunities for you and your business?

Decide how much of a threat they are to you and plan how to counter it.

How do they attract their customers? Can you better attract them away to you?

Use their best ideas to improve your own.

Competition in business is inevitable, but understanding it and so being able to prepare for it will make you and your business stronger.

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