You compete even if you don’t want to. Your business prospects will get second and third estimates or use your model numbers to make online comparisons.
I have found two ways most business leaders handle competitors:
1. Ignore them.
These business leaders build walls around what they listen to and view. They focus on the production of their product/service with great intensity, hoping to maintain a steady margin. The problem with this is that one day, the brand’s leadership will wake up and realize that 40% of their customers have switched to their competitor. This happens because of a market innovation, price point or new delivery option that the business leader would have been aware of months or even years before, if they had just observed their competitors.
2. Become consumed with them.
These business owners are so focused on every detail of what their competitors do that they start looking alike, speaking alike and marketing alike. Subconsciously, they believe that what their main competitors are doing is right, and they fear being left behind. The problem with this approach is that it positions the brand as a follower, not a leader. That position is nearly impossible to get out of once the marketplace picks up on it.
I have found both of these viewpoints to be unsuccessful. The best way to handle competition is not from an “ignorance” or “jealousy” standpoint, but rather as an observer. An observer knows who he is, is confident in his character and purpose in life and uses what’s around him as gold nuggets of opportunity to fast track his purpose. He doesn’t get caught in “jealousy” of his competitors’ success or in “ignorance” of them, but wisely uses them as marketplace indicators like the orange buoys on a river way.
An observer learns from his competitors’ “New Coke” failures, which allows him to maximize his R&D (research & development) department and adjust his structure. He is a doctor monitoring the health of his market through the symptoms of his competitors.
