Analyzing Your Competition

The need to analyze your competitor is the same in every industry.   We usually want tactical ways to get competitive information. First, however, you must start with a strategic plan. 

What is it you need to know about your competitors? 

Probably much more than just the prices. Probably more than just what their features and benefits are. It also depends on your position at your company. A CEO needs to know different things than a IT consultant who is going head to head in a sales meeting. Do you also want to know, how your competitor innovates? How do they recruit talent? First figure out what you need to know. 

Create a Corporate Template or Competition Spreadsheet

This gives you a place to capture data that comes in about all your competitors. This form needs to be available to everyone on the front lines working with clients and prospects. 

Tactical Methods of Getting Competitive Information

1. Best tactical is your converted clients. What do your clients who used to use that competitor say? Why did they convert. Have them tell you everything that answers the strategic things you want to find out. 
2. Of course web research but this is not the best. Web sites written by the competitor are designed to sell. So it is hard to know 1. Is what they are selling out yet or still in Beta and 2. What their weaknesses are except by conclusions from silence. 
3. Personally contact the competitor and ask them questions. Pose as a potential client. 
4. THIS ONE IS KEY: Assign competition champions. By this I mean: if you have 5 competitors, pick 5 people in your company whose job is to keep up with a specific company. Then as companies evolve you have up-to-date information. Regularly have them give up-dates to the template or spreadsheet. If a sales person found out that your competitor is offering a no-risk offer, the champion for that competitor is the person your sales person sends the update to.
5. Interview former employees of your competition of those you hired or those you are interviewing for jobs. Find out what the internal culture is like. Are they excited and growing or are they in panic mode. 
6. Ask targeted questions (from your strategic planning) of your network. LinkedIn is a great source for asking and finding references or concerns about a company.

There is a great article I just read called, 6 Reasons Your Business Needs More Competition.   There is a reason, Capitalism, spawns competition.  To ignore competition is to ignore your competitive advantage. 


After you gather competitive information your next step is to figure out what they will do before they do it.  I address that topic in my military strategy post:  Anticipating Battlefield Events.

Let me know how it works for you and your company.

Business Growth: The #2 & #3 Differentiators

Last time I discussed the top differentiator for a company that wants to rock in their industry.  Here are the next two.

Superior Employees

          The biggest reason my father never opened his own business was employees.  They can be either the greatest head ache or source of greatest joy.  The company I work for has a unique system.  It sets them apart from competitors.  But we didn’t start taking off until the president hired a top gun sales guy to reach our home city of Minneapolis and hired me to turn it into a national company.  On my wall I have written, “Recruiting Emerges as a Competitive Strategy.”

          As the owner of your company don’t feel that all the innovation, skill, and drive have to be from you alone.  Hiring or developing employees that can take your company to the next level is a huge advantage.  Your competition, who is not reading this magazine, is just grinding out another month of work.  Pushing their employees to show up on time and do acceptable work. 

          You, on the other hand, are investing in your business by reading Unlock Your Life Blog and searching for competitive advantage.  Great leaders don’t just lead, they surround themselves with great leaders.  Eisenhower could not have won World War II if he was the only general.  He had incredible generals and admirals working with him, Nimitz to run the naval fleet, Patton in north Africa, Bradley across Europe to Germany, McArthur in the pacific theater.  To be a captain of commerce you must have superior leadership.

Superior Operations Systems

          Finally we get to the operations, the products, and the equipment that may give you a competitive advantage.  Industry journals are a great source of companies advertising their unique machines and chemicals.  A wise business owner is not just looking at how to get more business but how to stay ahead.  Every month, our company is looking at products and services that are coming on the scene which we may want to add to our arsenal of unique services for our customers.

          When I was an infantry platoon leader in the U.S. Army I studied and applied strategies and tactics.  One key lesson I learned was I could not depend on one strategy to win all of my battles.  When I excelled, it was because I implemented a blend of various strategies and tactics in different proportions to my environment.  The same is true with your business.  Each of the unique advantages above can enhance your business.  However, you can dominate your market if you blend various advantages in varying degrees and apply it to your company.

Business Growth: THE #1 Differentiator

How can you differentiate yourself in a highly competitive field?  What if you are selling the exact same service?  What can you do to grow your business in tough times where the only differentiator seems to be price?

          Here is the first of three ways to make your company objectively different than your competitors.  Contrary to what manufacturers want you to believe these are also in highest impact order. 

Superior Sales Systems

          You may have the latest and most innovative system but without sales you have idle equipment in your warehouse.  Most companies focus on getting the newest gadget and fail to enhance the highest priority differentiator in any industry-sales systems.

          Many great inventions have gone with their inventors to the grave because they were not brought to the market.  Don’t let this happen to your company.  Focus on increasing your sales and marketing skills and systems.  Focus on creating actual sales systems that are better than your competition.  Then, even if you cannot afford the greatest new extractor or piece of equipment, you can beat you competitor.

          I own rental properties and have one where the weeds are getting out of control.  I went to the internet and found four companies that told me they were “The Best.”  I entered my information in their “Contact us” field and asked for someone to contact me so I could get that yard taken care of. 

• Company A called me within 10 minutes of my sending the request.
• Company B called me the next day
• Companies C and D never contacted me.

 

Company A got my business because not only did they call me right away, the sale person answered all my questions, set my expectations, and closed the deal on the first call.  The other three companies did not have a chance.  Who knows.  Maybe company B, C, or D have more efficient machines, more green chemicals, or better customer service.  They might have what they think is a competitive advantage but without superior sales force they have nothing.

Next time I will share with you what your second best differentiator is.

Strategic Thinking - Press the Fight

WARNING:  This is part 7 of a series on strategic thinking.  If you haven't read any before then this blog entry may not make as much sense.

When you have game-planned the battle scene and you have conserved or built up your force, the next step is to Press the Fight on YOUR terms.

Pressing the fight means:

1. Tenacity
2. Aggressive
3. Pushing the enemy into awkward positions.

We are launching the battle to franchise our company.  We have game planned, thought, and planned some more.  Now we are going for the big accounts.  That is Tenacity and Aggressiveness.

Crawl, Walk, then Run

I also believe in crawl, walk, and run as the way humans learn best.  That seems to contradict Pressing the Fight with aggression and tenacity.  It is NOT.

Some children take forever to walk.  Some move to walking quickly. 

We tested the concepts with small, local accounts in week one.  We met 100% success.
We tested the concepts with medium accounts in week two.  We met 100% success.

That's it.  Go for it.  That is what we are doing-Pressing the Fight.  Once you have done the prep work described in the previous sections, it is time to work harder and faster than your competition.  Press the Fight until you have victory.

Leadership: 3 Styles

Some things just don't change.  James Allen's eighth pillar in his book, Eight Pillars of Prosperity, written over 100 years ago is, "Self-reliance."

So I ask myself, "Am I self-reliant?"  We all would say "Yes. Of course."   

Self-Reliant Leader                       Self-Conceited Leader                    Self-Abasing Leader
Proper view of self worth              Exaggerated view of self worth         Reduced view of self worth
Continually Growing/Learning       Closed to Learning because            Thinks Learning only Helps                                                                       they "know it already"                   Other

Leads Confidently                         Leads Arrogantly                             Leads either:
  -Without Fear of Approval             -Tries to impress crowd or                 -Not at All
  -Concerned for Well-being            -No concern for followers                   -Tries to Please Crowd as
       of Followers                               - Most concern=Resume'                        Leadership Method

So key questions to help us objectively determine if we are self-reliant or not:

1. Am I continually learning?  Going to conferences? Reading books? Listening to audio training?
2. Am I concerned about what people think of me?
3. Am I more concerned about others well being than how they think of me?
4. Am I leading to build a great resume or because I really believe in the cause?

Leadership: Rise and Fall

Why do some leaders seem to climb so fast?  Why do some of those same leaders fall from the heavens?

I'm currently reading The End of Empire: Attila the Hun & the Fall of Rome.  The Huns were not subject to a king.  They had clans with leaders who could go to another clan and become a "comrade."  If that leader was charismatic he would build up a huge following.  "...Equally that following could quickly dissolve if he failed to live up to his promise.  The possibilities that ambitious individuals from any clan could choose to offer or withdrawal their support permitted the rapid rise - and sudden fall of prominent leaders."  p. 68.

At the same time I am finishing a book, Renovation of the Church.  In it the authors talk about how church goers and other church leaders evaluate the success of the pastor on a church's size and growth chart rather than on the pastoral care and direction given.  This pushes pastors to do two things to keep adherents:

1. They have to give talks aimed to attracts people.  Thus they tend to avoid talks that offend people or show the total cost of discipleship.
2. They do what they have to do, usually politically, to keep the influential leaders happy, pleased, attending, active, and donating.

"Church Leaders are too often like Political Leaders and

Political Leaders are too often like Church Leaders." - MWH

You can just look at the last election and see the impact of various preachers speaking politically and politicians trying to speaking like an evangelist.

The mark of a great leader is not the ability to draw a mob.

When we measure successful leadership on the numbers that follow (as a primary or sole indicator) rather than on the course set and how they are getting the organization there we expose ourselves to be:

1. Highly impressed with the rapid growth in an organization and 
2. Question, or believe something is secretly wrong with, a rapid decrease.

On my recent trip to Africa this summer I worked with a man who pastors a church over 1,000 people and oversees over 200 other churches.  He said,

"If you listen to what people want you will never make it [as a leader]."

I have tried to teach my adult children, "The mob is fickle."  

"They are like sheep without a shepherd."  - Jesus Christ.

What are your comments?  Agree?  Disagree?

Leadership: Leading Junior Leaders

Leadership is the ability to take a group of people to a predetermined objective.

It is not just the ability to determine the right objective.  It is the taking them there that is leadership.

Sometimes the selection of the rout to the objective can be delegated to your junior leaders.  This helps develop their leadership skills.  Sometimes the route must be selected by the senior leader.

When the senior leader must do the selection that leader must make the right decision no matter if he/she has consensus or not among the follower or among the junior leaders.

Yet, it is wise to make sure the junior leaders feel their perspectives and opinions have been heard and considered.  They they will come along the senior leader even if the route is different than they would take.

1. Sometimes the Junior leaders may have a more fresh or more creative route to the objective not considered by the senior leader.
2. No one likes to feel they are a slave to the leader.  All want to believe they are part of a team on a cause.  Not everyone likes the play called but they all have buy in to the play.  They want to feel that the team sees their value and contribution to the team.
3. Part of the development of junior leaders is teaching them to become great followers.  Great followers sometimes have to do what they don't want to do.  In fact one person said that is the definition of leadership, "making others do what you want them to do and not what they want to do.

Isn't that the way it is in marriage and work?  I may not want to do what my wife asks me to do but as long as she knows what other things I think need to be done and I know she values my opinion, I am much more willing to do as she asks.  So does that make her the senior leader?