Ever wonder how Google became the world’s most used search engine? Or what is the key to Apple’s success? Organizations that continually dominate in the marketplace understand their competitor’s strengths and weaknesses.
Study Your Competition
Knowing the weakness and strengths of your competition can help you brand, market, and position your business to stand out. Developing compelling strategies requires both analysis and synthesis. So, once you study your competition you’ll better understand how to create a strategy that can give you a competitive edge.
Competition and Talent
Organizations that can attract and retain the best talent are poised for success. If you fail to recruit the talent with the skills sets you need to grow and develop your business will never prosper in the long term. If you want to lure talented employees away from the competition and come work for you, think of incentives that would appeal to new hires. For example, in addition to offering higher salary prospects might be tempted to join your organization if you offer flexible working hours, more paid vacation time, and recognition such as a more important-sounding job title.
Operations and Your Competition
There is a difference between strategic planning and operational planning. The savvy execution of a strategic plan is achieved by creating an operational plan that details what gets done, timelines, and who is accountable for each task. Operational plans are the key to outperforming the competition. So, remember, if you want to outperform your competition, you’ll need a winning strategy that you can put into an operational plan and execute.
Customer Value and Your Competition
Sustainable growth and creating a profitable business require different approaches to delivering value to the customer. When Dell developed its highly profitable direct sales model, it designed a manufacturing framework that allowed the consumer to customize the experience of buying a home computer. Today, this concept is rather standard in the e-commerce space but when Dell first launched this sales feature it outperformed its rivals allowing it to outsell its competition. Think about how you could reimagine service delivery to outperform your competition. You might be able to execute a simple strategy that ultimately helps you take the lead in your sector.
Customer Loyalty and the Competition
Customers are king so always keep them in mind. Remember, if your customers like how you deliver your products and services, they will likely remain loyal to your business. Long-term loyal customers are key to sustainability and profitability. The executives at Google and Apple know this. So, both Google and Apple take the time to study their competition, then they go off and create strategies and operational plans that help them outpace the competition and keep their customers happy.
Elaine Allan, BA, MBA
Technology & Business Blogger
Vancouver, BC, Canada