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Become an expert on your competitors

Posted By: Thomas Shaw, 12:45am Thursday 15 January 2009    Print Article

In business, having competitors goes with the territory. There’s almost always someone selling the same product or service you are selling, or at least trying to solve the same customer problem you solve.

It's not personal, it's just business!

We have known about our competitors Destination Talent's test site http://www.philliptusing.com/recruiter/ for more than 6 months, checking out the site occasionally to see how much they have copied us, or the data they have scraped from the RCSA member directory. What have I said previously about online security and protecting your test site http://www.recruitmentdirectory.com.au/Blog/secure-your-website-a34.html or http://www.recruitmentdirectory.com.au/Blog/reminder-to-all-do-not-put-your-test-website-online-a27.html because it will be found.

Oviously, if they can't protect the websites security now...when launched, clients should be worried.

Another interesting development was a programming request made on RentACoder http://www.rentacoder.com for a "Recruitment Agency Search Program" http://www.rentacoder.com/RentACoder/misc/BidRequests/ShowBidRequest.asp?lngBidRequestId=1064616 another person scraping the RCSA member database ey? It's not that hard; just ask me for the script.



Not only can competitors out-market you and steal your valuable prospects and customers; they can put you out of business if you’re not careful. Trying to fight back by out-marketing your competitors can not only get expensive, it can be frustrating.

But there is another solution.

Make the decision to keep increasing the amount of information stored about your competitors each time you review your business plans so that you build an extensive collection of facts and figures regarding their organisation. This way you can design effective strategies that take into account the true market place you are operating in.

Competitors' websites, if analyzed properly, can give you all sorts of information that you can use to increase the traffic and the popularity of your site.

Eliminating your competitors is the easiest way to increase your chances of business success. It isn’t that hard when you know what you’re doing. Become a expert in the industry you are servicing, build trust and loyalty and the clients will follow. Exploit weaknesses and act on their failure.

Here is a list of questions to ask yourself in your own recruitment business.
  • Make a list of their product/service benefits?
  • What are the benefits your product/service offers?
  • Identify the features they have that you don't have?
  • Identify the features that you have? Compare.
  • What features are better in their product.
  • What features are better in yours?
  • Why are they better (from a buyers perspective)?
  • What is their price?
  • What is your price?
  • Why is your price different?
  • What emotional needs/desires does your product meet?
  • What physical needs/desires does your product meet?
  • What is the size of your competitor’s business?
  • Where is this competitor marketing? Find their ads, always keep them in your file.
  • What type of customer care do they offer? Research and find out.
  • What type of customer care are you going to offer?
  • What’s different about your customer care or how can it be?
  • Do you offer a special type of advice that they don't? If so, what?
  • If you offer confidentiality, in what ways do you offer this?
  • What are their "availability" hours?
  • Do they offer product discounts? What are their break points?
  • Do they offer value-added incentives? This could be in the form of complimentary documentation or time, newsletters, or other items. What can you offer that is better?
  • What makes you excited about selling this product?
  • How long have they been in business?
  • If you haven't been in business as long, can you explain your quick success?
  • What do customers say about them? What do yours say? Similar is good but unique statements help more.
  • What statistics do you have on your product that you can use to show your uniqueness?
  • Do they have any endorsements?
  • How frequently does your competitor introduce something new in order to stay on the cutting edge? And you?
  • How fast can they get their product to their customers? Can you do better?
  • Were they the first in developing this product? How long ago was that? Do you have newness as an advantage?



Article URL: http://www.recruitmentdirectory.com.au/Blog/become-an-expert-on-your-competitors-a70.html

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