Are you worried that your product or service will have to be marketed in a market saturated with competitors? It’s certainly something that can limit your options.
But let’s not kid ourselves: this isn’t something you plan for.
You may well have no choice but to market your product in a market where there are already a great many competitors.
Or, because it’s a profitable sector, new ones may keep appearing.
Whatever the reason, what you must do is make the most of your options.
How do we do that?
· Don’t obsess over having the best product in your sector
Reason, or logic, can lead us to think that customers will always buy the best product. Or that they will hire the best service.
The one with the best features or functionality.
That can lead us to try to be the best: to offer more features, better materials, and so on.
Before you start working on every possible improvement to your product, ask yourself:
► Do those features fit my target customer?
It seems obvious, but it isn’t always!
We don’t always really analyze what the target customer needs.
And many other times it’s impossible to know, because there are multiple target customers with multiple needs.
Even asking them directly may not be useful, because many customers won’t answer, and many others may say they’re interested in something they don’t actually plan to pay for.
There are a lot of variables!
► Besides, everything you do can be copied
This is an unavoidable reality. Anything you can improve in your product can be copied, if it’s worth it.
In other words, if, once you’ve done the development, your competition sees that it’s an interesting improvement, they may decide to copy it.
It will take them more or less time, but anything can be copied.
Everything except a few things. But we’ll get to that later.
► Focus on what your product is already better at
Not necessarily better than your competitors, but what your customers already value.
What they buy or hire you for.
That’s what you should strengthen.
· Price: be careful about lowering it
One of the most immediate actions, and one that apparently leads to higher sales, is lowering prices.
The problem with lowering prices lies mainly in the perceived quality of the product, and this is no secret. We inevitably associate more expensive products with higher quality.
That may be a problem for your product, or it may not.
First of all,
► Do whatever math is needed
To find out what price range would make your product profitable, and how much you can lower your prices.
And above all, just as I mentioned earlier that everything can be copied…
► Low prices can be copied too
That’s right: it’s hard to lower prices to a point where none of your competitors can match or beat them.
You may have heard the term “economies of scale”: it refers to the actions companies can take to reduce production costs when producing large volumes of a product, and therefore to the possibility of lowering the price.
The problem here affects those small and medium-sized businesses that can’t use these strategies.
So competing on price may be a strategy that doesn’t get you very far.
In these cases you may prefer to use one-off strategies.
· Offers and discounts, yes, but sensibly
Two of the most effective ways to change the price temporarily are offers and discounts.
They are good strategies, and most businesses use them with their products or services. That’s because there are in fact times and dates in the year when customers are used to receiving these kinds of offers and discounts.
► Is it a good strategy?
It certainly is. And not only for increasing sales.
The best thing you can do with a discount strategy is use it to get contacts, that is, email addresses.
Why do this?
So that you can try to make the sale more than once. Because it isn’t always possible to close the sale in a single contact with the customer.
Having the customer’s email address means we can use a bulk email tool to try to communicate with them more than once.
It’s a good idea to do this even when using discounts, because many discounts are forgotten once received, while the potential customer looks for the best moment to use them.
► But don’t overdo them!
Ultimately, if you constantly use discounts, it’s as if you had actually changed the product’s price.
That will be the customer’s perception, and if they know discounts are routine, they won’t actually buy or hire you until they receive one.
So you need to be quite careful with this.
In that case, what works best?
· Repeating key messages
Repetition is one of the most effective strategies available, especially when selling in markets saturated with competitors.
Why?
For several reasons:
- Continuous visibility of the product or brand helps the customer not forget the possible solution to their problem
- It builds trust. A product or service that the customer is regularly exposed to is seen as more reliable than one they aren’t.
- It lets you try to communicate from several points of view
- Or respond to various possible objections
All of these are very important points.
► Look at it this way
From the customer’s perspective.
Imagine a sector with 20 or more possible brands available to solve what they need. Is it likely that they know or remember them all?
No, they probably know two or three of the biggest brands, and may remember a few more if they’ve recently seen an ad.
If they need to compare different alternatives, they will first pick the ones they know, and then, perhaps, look for more alternatives.
In any case, the brands they already know will give them greater confidence, precisely because they already know them.
► Which message is most effective to repeat?
The most common approach is to focus on the most important points:
- The most distinctive element of your product. Ideally, what your potential customers value most and, if possible, what your competitors don’t offer.
- A feature your competitors don’t have.
- Or, if possible, a limitation of competing products or services. This option tends to be very effective.
- Answers to the most common objections your customers may have.
The messages don’t need to be long; what we want is to make “impressions” on potential customers:
To become someone they know.
► Which channels are best to use?
The truth is that any channel is valid for achieving this goal. It doesn’t matter where they see your product, as long as they see it:
- Social media
- Ads or advertising
- Blog content
- Newsletter
Use whichever option best fits your resources.
· Create something that can’t be copied
So far we’ve said that practically everything can be copied, whether it’s features or low prices.
Is there anything that can’t be copied?
In fact, there is.
The brand.
Of course, your competitors can “copy” some aspects of your brand. But not to the point of it being identical.
And something that’s harder for them to copy is the story behind your brand:
- The motivations for creating your product or service
- Its objectives or goals
- The values it shares with its target customers
All of that together can’t be copied.
► Can that help you sell more in a market saturated with competitors?
Yes, and it’s not just a differentiating element
It can also help you empathize with customers, if you manage to show values in which they can see themselves reflected, or that they aspire to.
It may not be easy, but if you achieve it, it really will be something that can’t be copied.
An advantage in a market saturated with competitors.
A unique differentiator for your product or service.
Something your customers want.
· In summary
The main difficulties you may face in markets saturated with competitors are:
- Getting the visibility your customers need to find you
- The differentiation needed for them to choose you over your competitors
- And the ability to reach potential customers as many times as needed to close the sale
These difficulties can be overcome, in part, with the options we’ve seen.
We hope you find them useful.
