The remarkable thing about locating and studying your competition is that you can let the competition do all your research for you. The competition is already making money and is already profitable. Therefore, the procedures, systems, and processes they use are telling for you and can help you jump ahead without spending the same time and resources to increase your business growth.
- The Size of The Audience – How big is their audience? Look to the business’s documentation if they’re a public business or within the “about me” section or press section of their website. You can also judge by watching their social media interactions and engagement. If the audience is large, that means that there is room for more.
- The Mindset of The Audience – By reading discussions in the competitor’s community and in discussion groups, only you can figure out the audience’s mindset during the current time. Are they optimistic about the future, or are they struggling?
- The Price Point the Audience Likes – By noting how much your competitors charge for various products and services, you can figure out the best price point to start with for your own business too. This process alleviates a lot of errors. Typically, you can stick within 25% up or down on price and still be competitive if you’re turning enough profit.
- The Gaps You Can Fill – Based on customer complaints about the product or service, you can locate gaps in value-added that you can fill. For example, if you’ve started a meal planning website, you may notice that the other meal planning sites have too many pop-up ads or too many distractions that remove the customer’s joy and find ways to do better.
- Where and How the Audience Gets Their Information – Inactive communities, you can find out where your competition’s audience gets their information by asking the community for advice. They’ll point you right to the information, and that will give you a clue about where you need to be noticed.
- Where the Audience Like to Hang Out – The other thing you can learn when studying your competitor’s audience is where they like to hang out, online and offline. If there is no overall like-community organized yet, that might indicate a need for one.
- How They Use Social Media to Engage the Audience – Watch your competition to find out how they use social media. How they use it, which platforms they spend the most time on, and the effort they take will suggest to you the importance of that platform.
- The Keywords Your Competitors Use to Attract the Audience – This is one of the best things you can learn from your competition even if you don’t use a site like iSpionage.com to help you get started using competitor keywords faster.
Read the case studies your competition publishes. The insight into the customer’s mindset will help you make offers that appeal to them. Another way is to participate in the competition’s communities, engage with the audience as a customer yourself after buying your competition’s products, or use their services to learn about styles, processes, and more.
