How to beat your competition in marketing?
Let me start off by stating the obvious: there is no perfect strategy. There is no strategy that will make sure that you are always one step ahead of your competition. If somebody is trying to convince you otherwise, he or she is wrong. Even if that person is your direct manager, boss or some opinion leader.
But we can follow a simple wireframe of actions that will make sure that you are always on top of your game. Always on the hunt for places where your competition is lacking or just ignoring and pounce on those chances. Just like wolves are stalking their prey for the right moment to go for a kill. Embody wolf-like mentality. (Sorry Jordan Belfort. This is isn’t reference to you)
Research your competitors
When we are developing our marketing strategy we instantly want to go ahead and think of all the digital tools available to us: social media paid ads, Google Paid Ads, SEO etc. We are looking at classic metrics such as CTR, CTC, CAC and evaluating where we can squeeze a little bit more of that PPC juice.
What we should start doing is look at our competition: What they are doing. Where are they focusing their efforts? What are their strong sides? How creative is it? Do they have great copywriting? What is their approximate budget? Or maybe what is the size of their marketing team? Research their efforts as much as you are following your own tactics.
When they publish something, be one of the first to see it — and research the hell out of it. Try to understand why they are doing this and what their end-goal is. When you know their tactics just as well as they know it, you can start to understand their weaknesses: What are they lacking? What are they not doing? What are they doing, but they are putting in low effort? You need to know that just like you know your Starbucks order. You know how Sheldon from Big Bang Theory was obsessed with String Theory? Be like that!
Evaluate
Now that you know your competition ins and outs it’s time to book a meeting with Google Sheets. Put everything you have researched in comparison to your current efforts and tactics. Be as detailed as you can. If something seems not important — still put that into the database. You have to be able to see everything at a single glance to see everything and understand the motive, creative vision and path they are taking.
When you have done that, you will start to see the path of least resistance where you can improve or even create a new channel of strategy. Evaluate the necessary tools and resources for you to crush that segment. Is that PPC? Double down on that. Is that social media presence? Triple your efforts! Their communication sucks? Be the cool kid and chat with everyone! Find what they lack — and strike!
Go off the books
When you have evaluated your possible points of action — as Jocko Willink would preach “take complete ownership of that space”. Get together with your creative team and start to brainstorm plans and tactics you can implement to go into space with a huge bang.
Throw a grenade of creativity and resources in that channel — and make it count. So that your competition doesn’t know what hit them. And keep the pressure on. When you start to see results don’t go sleeping and rely on that first impact — as Grant Cardone would say “10X on that”. Don’t allow your competition to retaliate. Be the commanding force in that channel.
Rinse and repeat these steps and overpower your competition!
