Know Who You Are Up Against

Whether a company likes it or not (which in most cases they don't), competitors are out there and they are hungry for customers. That is why it is important to know your competition and even keep tabs on them. It might be time and energy devoting, but it will be well worth it. There are a lot more advantages then disadvantages in knowing and understanding your competition. You might be a  business owner who's need is to understand what other forces are out there that might want to target your costumers, or you might be a business that wants to win over new costumers. Either way, it is important to do research. Nowadays we live in the world full of information that is available to us at our fingertips, you just need to learn how to take advantage of that information. There are a lot of unpaid and paid online tools to help you with your research. Let me share some of the steps and tips that I have used to research competitors. 

1. Identify Top 5 Competitors: This can be done by Google search. Use appropriate keywords that you use while searching so you can see the top sites. For example, if you provide website design then you would want to search "Website design" or "Website Development". 

2. Time to do Some Basic Research: Now that you know who you're up against, start browsing through your competitor’s online site. Read through their information and make a list of all the things you like, and all the things you don’t like. Ask yourself questions like: 

• What are their prices like compared to yours?
• Is their site mobile friendly?
• What is their social media presence like; which platforms do they use; how often do they interact with customers, and how do they speak with their customers?

3.  Dig Deeper: Now that you know the basics, you might want to look a little deeper. You can use tools such as Alexa, which is a (mostly) free service that will help you analyze traffic on your competitor's website. Here is a great blog for some tools you can use: 25 Sneaky Online Tools 

4. Now Evaluate: Evaluate the information you find about your competitors.This will help you with better understanding the areas you can improve on yourself, it will also show whether there are any gaps in the market you can exploit. What can help it drawing up a list of everything that you have found and learned about your competition. It can also help if you put the information into categories. Or you can use SWOT analysis. 

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4. Monitor Your Competitors' Change: You would want to monitor your competitor to see if they are changing their strategies. Rival IQ can help you quickly see when a competitor’s approach to social media and their results are changing at a glance on the major social networks.

Now that you have a better idea of what you are up against, you can start improving your own business. But remember, Try to innovate not imitate.