Bury Your Business Competitors and Move Your Home Business Start Up Forward
 When developing a home business start up, you need to know
as much as possible about your business competitors, as you will want to ‘beat’ your competitors and capture
as many customers as you can. You need to find out such things as:-
* How many competitors you have;
* What their product/service it like;
* What are their product costs etc.
There is no doubt about it - with the Internet it is so much easier to research just what our business
competitors are doing; yet so few home business start up operators do this. It is nearly as though they
think that the customers out there are only going to come to them.
The potential client is researching on the Internet to help them make decisions on which supplier to use. If you do not have a web presence you are automatically disadvantaged and
your business competitors, who do have a presence on the web, will win their business. The Internet is the main
place potential clients gather information from. A Google search is often more common than a Yellow Pages
search.
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No
Cost
It is so easy to forget who you have researched and what you found out. A record
will allow you to check quickly and will keep you better informed - and remind you when to repeat
certain research! After all - you MUST keep up to date with your competitors.
Home business start up operators can access
a FREE template to log your
business competitors
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You need to have a Research Table with as much information about your business competitors as possible. Don’t be
shy about ringing competitors up and pretending you are a potential client; you can sometimes get great information
from your business competitors this way. If you can research at least three business competitors, you will soon see
if there is a trend that you have to consider when designing and marketing your product and developing your home
business start up.
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Case Study #1 for Home Business Start Up
Operators
to Think About
Martin Close decided to ring the company of the business competitor he was researching. He
particularly wanted some information on pricing, so he asked if he could speak to the accountant.
The answer came back that the accountant was very busy - could she tell him what the call was
about? “Oh yes” said Martin, “I wanted to stock your product, but the word out
there is that your company is about to go under, so I just wanted some reassurance.”
Within a few seconds the accountant was on the phone, quite distressed by the news. He was so
keen to put Martin’s worry to rest, that he started telling him all sorts of financial details -
which Martin wrote down as quickly as he could. At the end of the conversation, the accountant said
“please let me know if you hear any more rumours like this - and thank you for bringing this to
my attention.”
A bit sneaky perhaps, but it had the desired outcome and no one was hurt as the information
was kept confidential.
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Case Study #2 for Home Business Start
Up
Two silk screen printers were badly affected with the Gas Explosion in Melbourne and could not
use their drying ovens which were powered by gas. They found a third printer who used electricity
and asked could they rent his ovens of a night when he was not using them. He agreed.
Over the weeks they got to know each other and realised that they specialised in different areas
of printing; one on hard objects e.g. mugs; one as placement prints e.g. T-shirts; and one on
stretch fabric e.g. bathers. They decided to form an alliance and every time a potential client
walked in their door with a job they couldn’t do, they accepted it and got one of the others in the
Alliance to complete the task.
All three competitors increased their sales as customers knew they could get anything printed
without having to chase around for someone with the expertise they needed. A wonderful example of
competitors working together.
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TIP for Home
Business Start Up Wanting to Research
Their Business Competitors
Don’t always think of your competitor as the enemy. If you are both
targeting a different niche market or if one has something the other would like access to, consider
forming an alliance.
Carefully thought out alliances can grow a business dramatically. Consider
doing a SWOT analysis on your main competitors....it can show you what direction to go in to ensure
your business remains unique.
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Low
Cost
Learn
how to look after your
customers and how even home business start up operators can 'bury' their
competitors.
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