Competition is the most advanced and uncompromising retail mechanism. It is the competition for the client that forces entrepreneurs to improve service and lower the price. Stomping on the spot can lead the business to disastrous consequences.
Anyone can steal a bucket of water from you. But no one can steal your source. This basic idea should relax everyone who, in developing a business, worries that someone is copying them, stealing their ideas or acting unethically.
What does that "source" that no one can steal from you mean?
First and foremost is the love for what you do. Some competitors might venture to do what they see in you, not understanding all the challenges you have had to overcome ... out of love for your idea.
Secondly, what is practically impossible to steal is your experience. Those 10,000 hours, successes and failures, everything that did not come out in public and all the details that you managed to understand during the process.
Thirdly, it is impossible for someone to steal your personal motivation, which leads you daily to become better, grow your business and make more customers happy.
Thousands of books have been written on how to deal with competitors. But only those techniques that have proven effectiveness will be listed below. They can be divided into two categories:
- active, aimed at luring customers;
- passive, aimed at customer retention.
Active methods of competition for the buyer include:
- Conducting a price war;
- Aggressive advertising, placing one’s own advertising near a competitor’s store;
- Increasing sales channels;
- The formation of beneficial distinctive features of the store and their communication to the target audience;
- The opening of trading microdots near a competitor, which will financially deplete it;
- Information on the shortcomings of goods sold by a competitor;
- The use of system marketing tools to position the store on the market and promote the product.
Passive methods of competition for a client include:
- Training of personnel in sales techniques, the development of communication standards;
- Hiring only the best sellers;
- Launching a discount program;
- The constant monitoring of competitors;
- The automation of trade and the implementation of CRM;
- Constant optimization of the assortment using the program of warehouse accounting;
- Creating your own unique image.
Every business owner must know how to deal with competitors in trade. The main thing is to understand that everything is always changing: the assortment, the customers, the methods of advertising, even the customers’ needs. Therefore, competitors need to keep themselves within the client’s sight and be proactive.
