Building A Successful Business In Ten Steps - Step 1 - Suss Your Competition
When starting a new business, or thinking of starting a new business, it is very important to check out who's already out there, what they're offering, and what they're charging and how they are marketing their services/products.
Learning about your competitors will help you to change, improve, or even reformat your products or services, and your marketing techniques.
There are several ways to learn about your competitors, you can go to their store(s), talk and/or survey to their customers, read up in various industry reports, join industry associations, see where they advertise and of course go on the Internet.
The best, and easiest way, to find your direct competitors' Web sites, (if you don't have them already) is to do online searches using Google, Yahoo, MSN, or any other preferred search engine. Make sure you search both the names of your competitors, and the general description of your product/service, and if appropriate, the geographic location. If nothing is coming up, you might try using alternative phrases too.
After you locate several of your competitor's websites, make sure you look through the entire site. Do you like their site? Are the colors conducive to purchasing? Is it easy to navigate? Is it easy to locate their products? Is it easy to purchase something online? (If appropriate) Do they have a contact us page and/or an about us page? After looking though the website, jot down what you liked and didn't like, then decide to do something better or different with your website.
Completing your review of several of your competitor's websites, you should see where the common thread is, are your prices in line with theirs? Are you targeting the same audience? What are you offering that is different? Then ask yourself, why would someone buy from you instead of your competitors? Use this knowledge and your positive mindset, (and superior product), and tweak your marketing and sales campaign to enhance your sales.
Make sure that you round out your knowledge about your competitors by finding out how they fit into their local economies. Do they dominate a regional market where your business will have a presence? Ask yourself if this will hurt you, and how you can do something different. Final question to ask yourself is, "How will you be different from your Competitors?"
For more on business success contact susan@amnenterprises.com for a review of your business strategy and start up ideas.
Related Tags: business, business start up, building a business, internet research, competion
Susan Feder is a certified Life Coach, who specializes in business and success coaching. She is the owner of AMN (Achieve More Now) Enterprises. She currently is offering individual and group coaching, Mastermind Groups and personalized workshops and retreats.
For assistance in the start up or expansion of a small business go to http://www.amnenterprises.com
She is also to creator of "This Months Challenge", check out the blog at http://this-months-challenge.blogspot.com
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