Competitors! We all have them. Whether you are launching a start-up or looking to enhance your presence on the web, you’ll want to know what your competitors are doing. A competitor analysis will help you understand your competitors’ strengths and weaknesses. Here are three ways to get ahead of your competition:
1. Identify your sales cycle
1. Find out what problems they’re solving and provide a better solution than them
Approach the competitor analysis as if you were a customer yourself. Identify what problems your competitors are solving for the industry by scanning potential keywords and researching their websites. Tools such as ‘Answer The Public’ will tell you what customers are looking for. Here’s a bit about these tools and why they can help you.
- Answer The Public – Get keyword predictions from Google and divides them into categories such as why, how, and what. Get to know what your potential audience is searching for.
- Google Trends – This lets you know how frequently a search term is entered into the Google search engines and how its popularity changes over time.
2. Identify what customers they have and treat them as your potentials
Your competitors are currently serving people who are facing a problem. You can interview these people and find out their needs. Identify why their customers have chosen to work with the competitors, and what made them choose one solution over another. Once you have developed your solution (it could include a competitor analysis pricing strategy), begin contacting the customers to offer it to them.
There are two groups you want to consider here – both ordinary users and expert users. Ordinary users are casual browsers, whereas experts know what they’re looking for. Ordinary users can be easy to make sales with, but you’ll need research for expert users.
3. Look for hidden market players you haven’t identified before
While your direct competitors may be easy to spot (they probably serve the same area and offer a similar product or service to yours), there are plenty of people you’re competing with that you might not identify immediately. You can talk to customers, or use tools such as Moz and Google Alerts to get immediate notifications of new and emerging players in your field.
- Find out your competitor’s website rank and keyword performance
- Get updates every time your competitors are mentioned online
- Identify your competitor’s products, problems, solutions, benefits, offers, marketing efforts
- Craft offerings better than theirs using all these factors and more.
Competitor Analysis + Strategy = Powerful Combination
Competitor analysis is the foundation to create a strategy which helps you add levels to your competitors’ quality. The Bumblebee Branding Company can help you with competitor analysis in less than 48 hours with our customized competitor analysis services.
