3 Reasons Learning More About Your Competition Is Vital

It’s a dog-eat-dog marketplace out there. Just because you think you have a solid business plan and a great product to sell, doesn’t mean you’ll succeed. The competition can be ruthless.

Digital technology has made it easier than ever for companies to reach larger and larger audiences. That’s a remarkable opportunity on the one hand. But it ratchets up the number of competitors you face on the other.

You need to find out what and who you’re up against and what makes you different or the same from them. Only then will you be able to arm yourself with the knowledge you need to distinguish yourself amid the growing crowd. Here are a few good reasons why learning more about your competition is vital to your company’s success.

1. It’s the Only Way You’ll Know Your Strengths and Weaknesses

If you don’t know how your business compares with its competition, you don’t know how to position yourself in the marketplace. Something must set you apart in the eyes of consumers. If you offer nothing, who they buy from is left completely to chance.

This examination involves substantially more than just saying you’re offering a better product or that yours costs less than the competition’s. You need to take a deep dive into finding what makes you better. It runs the gamut, from how you treat employees and serve customers to how you market your business.

So much of your marketing strategy in the digital age concerns content. And one great way to find out where your marketing efforts stand among your competitors is performing a competitive content analysis. It’s a surefire way to uncover their weaknesses so you can exploit them in your own content strategy.

Stop thinking that you’ll have to spend hours wading through websites, long-tail keywords, and search engine results by hand. AI can pull data and analyze it quickly and effortlessly. That analysis and yours will provide sharp insights you can use to shape your strategy.

Competitive content analysis helps you discover how your content compares to what your competitors are putting out there. It also uncovers openings your competition is leaving so you can fill them which improves your SEO. And in a time where content is king, it might be the secret to assuming the throne.

2. You Need to Fill Market Gaps

Some of the greatest opportunities for business growth and success lie somewhere in the gaps. There’s sure to be an unrequited need for a product or service somewhere out there. Unless you know what your competition is up to, you won’t spot those holes, let alone fill them before someone else does.

First, inventory the products and services you’re offering and how those are addressing customer pain points. Reach out to your customers to learn about problems they aren’t finding solutions for. Keep up with industry trends, startups, and consumer chatter. Social media — both yours and your competitors’— might be a great place to learn what consumers want now.

Brainstorm ways you can either use your products differently or position them laterally. Sometimes, filling a customer need doesn’t require a new product or service. You can often respond by repositioning something you already have or adapting its use.

For example, you market baking soda using food-related channels. A competitive market analysis indicates consumer demand for chemical-free cleaning products. That means you can market your baking soda to that new audience as well by creating cleaning-focused content.

If you don’t analyze what your competition is doing in your industry space, you’ll miss those lucrative openings. The first company to fill them will already be established before other companies realize there’s an opportunity. Get a jump on your competition.

3. Success Lies With Anticipating Threats

The best defense against competition in business is a good offense. At any moment, a competitor may make a move that threatens the viability of your business. If the competition catches you on your heels, you may never be able to catch up.

Threats come in all shapes and sizes and from all corners. They can negatively impact your financial performance, customer and employee satisfaction, and the reputation you’ve worked hard to build. You’ll need to search for them inside and out.

Internally, product pricing changes, new product launches, and an ill-informed and lackluster marketing strategy could threaten you. Externally, new competitors and suppliers, changes in consumer behaviors, and business expansion could harm your bottom line.

Analyzing your competition’s history and current operations are key to helping you anticipate the future. Look at what they’re doing within the context of trending market dynamics, emerging technology, and economic forecasts. And don’t forget to stay current with predictive industry trends.

Use information about your own business, your industry, and your competition to mitigate competitive risk by getting out ahead of it. If you invest in a concerted effort in a little savvy prognostication, you’ll identify threats early. Remember that forewarned is forearmed.

Know Thy Competition

To paraphrase Sun Tzu, if you know your enemy like you know yourself, you’ll never be defeated. The success of your business begins and ends with how well you know your competition. Analyzing your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats is a tried-and-true method of continuous improvement. But you can’t do it in a vacuum. To sweep the competition, you must know what you’re up against and what opportunities you can seize. Then you’ll know how you need to transform to make your business resilient.