Intelligently reacting to new competitors requires you to give them the benefit of the doubt but if your prospects or customers are not asking about them then focus on what they are asking you.
Evaluating and Reacting to New Competitors
What’s your reaction when a previously unknown competitor appears on the market?
Perhaps they are better funded or staffed with famous entrepreneurs, or they announce one or more significant customer deals.
If your prospects are not bringing them up, I would continue with Plan A. If you have selected an important problem to solve, you will always have competition: no one has a market for themselves for very long. Don’t fall into the marketing echo chamber where you respond to their messaging instead of what your prospects and customers are asking for.
More startups are decoyed by competitive announcements and datasheets than you would care to believe.
Not everything your competitor says they can do is true, but you must give them the benefit of the doubt. If testimonials or customer case studies are not offered, the probability that you are looking at messaging instead of reality goes way up. If your prospects or customers are not asking about them, then focus on what they are asking you.
Many teams are more undone by their fears and imagination than reality. Intelligently reacting to new competitors requires you to remain alert to possibilities by closely examining competitors and what they are saying. They may give you clues on how to differentiate your offering by making it more useful and compelling to your target market.
How did Craigslist drive so many better-funded competitors into oblivion? It was not by copying the features in their press releases and product announcements. The same thing happened for SalesForce, displacing an earlier era of sales automation tools. RightNow technologies bootstrapped CRM solutions against better-funded but ultimately less nimble competitors.
You cannot take an entrenched competitor head-on if the market is well established. Most startups must fight a “battle of maneuver” in a market that is still emerging. You must identify key opportunities to pursue; these will come as much from talking with prospects as reading your competitor’s announcements and giving up hope.
Related Blog Posts
- Erecting Barriers to Competition That Are Difficult to Duplicate
- Competitive Intelligence for Bootstrapping Startups
- Extracting Insights From A Competitor’s Software Demo
- Be Wary of Competition That Cares Deeply
- Q: How Much Attention Should I Pay To Potential Competition?
- The Science of Targeting: How Startups Select the Perfect Niche
- Key Questions to Answer Before Adding A Feature to Niche Software
Pingback: SKMurphy, Inc. » George Gilder: Entrepreneurship is the Launching of Surprises