Building a Business in a Competitive Environment

Competition plays a key role in business; it creates a healthy flow of supply and demand, creates a fair market for consumers, and fosters innovation for more effective solutions to the world’s problems. That being said, building a business in a competitive environment can be difficult. Here are four tips on how to do just that:

Look For a Need

Every good business idea comes from a clear identification of a consumer need not being met. Look for that “need” within the market you are looking to penetrate, whether it’s food or tech. For example, if you notice a particular ethnic cuisine is heavily poultry-based, you could step in and create vegan or vegetarian alternatives for customers who want to enjoy the same ethnic dishes but are unable to eat meat for dietary restrictions or personal beliefs.

Be At Your Industry’s Center

Just as many tech startups set up their base in San Francisco and a lot of food trucks or eccentric restaurants make their way to Los Angeles, you’ll want to live in your industry’s main hub, wherever that may be. It’s an easy way to get initial brand recognition for your business and gives you a better idea of who you are dealing with, what customers you should be targeting, etcetera.

Know Who the Key Players Are

Knowing that your industry is competitive isn’t enough; you need to know who the players are. This includes competing businesses, suppliers, distributors, technologies, and substitute products that your customers may choose as an alternative. Knowing who your competitors are, how they operate in the market, which consumers they are targeting, and what particular needs they are addressing can help you position yourself competitively, whether it’s with a diverse offering or a better price point.

Cover the Basics

Study the culture that envelops your market, including the varied lifestyles and values that make up your target audience. Knowing the present culture of your market helps you determine where it’s headed in the future and thus allows you to position your brand message, product/service offerings, and marketing campaigns accordingly.

A competitive environment should not be avoided, but rather entrepreneurs should learn how to navigate around it. Use the four tips aforementioned in this article to lay the foundation from which you can slowly build your business in its respective niche.

When Should You Consider Rebranding Your Company

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When Should You Consider Rebranding Your Company?

Jason Kumpf September 30, 2020 0

Building your business into a recognizable brand is always a challenge, but the growth your company sees, as a result, will be rewarding. Unfortunately, some branding efforts miss their mark and don’t produce the results you anticipated. Here are a few examples of situations in which you may have to rebrand your business with a fresh strategy.

Your Brand’s Philosophy Isn’t Understood

It’s usually pretty easy to tell when your efforts to build your brand have failed. Either through social media interactions or through your own consumer testing, your customers will let you know that they don’t understand your brand’s message. If you find this to be the case, you should begin developing a rebranding campaign that will make your message clearer. Taking the time to rethink how you’re branding your business may help you come up with marketing ideas that you hadn’t previously considered…

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The Best Social Media Platforms for Business

Social media platforms have increased business sales and visibility, allowing them to reach a broader market. Social media enables businesses to package themselves and products to attract more customers and cover a general geographical location than their stores. Some of the best social media platforms to expand business includes;

Facebook

Facebook is one of the most used social media platforms. It covers various marketing options that include images, music, and photos to promote events. Facebook uses multiple tools that enable businesses to attract a wider audience and customize their products to suit them.

It also enlists paid advertisements and social media campaigns that enable businesses to increase their clientele and drive sales. Thus, it is a critical social media platform as it brings a vast number of buyers and sellers under one roof making sales easier…

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Improving Client Communication

Improving the communications between the business and the client matters because of how this will reduce the number of errors and lead to higher customer satisfaction. Serving customers is really what business is all about. And while making money does matter, you should always remember that customers are the foundation of your business. So, what can businesses do to improve all communication with clients?

Build a Relationship

Businesses should understand how their relationship with their client will continue for years if they nurture it. When working with a client, always be sure to let them know they’re more than just a sale. Regular follow-ups and communication are a great way to do this. This also eliminates the risk that the client will walk away unhappy.

Practice Active Listening

When a business stops actively listening to customers, it will surely create a rift in your client relationships. As a business, you need to understand your customer’s wants and needs. Use this communication to alter your internal processes and general functionality better. When you take client insights seriously, you’re bound to provide them with a better product or service…

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How Mentoring Can Improve Leadership Skills

Mentorship is one of the aspects that have been significantly overlooked in terms of improving leadership skills. One may not know it, but it is one way of fast learning and discovering suppressed strengths. That said, below are some ways that mentorship helps individuals to become better leaders;

It Improves Storytelling Abilities

Mentoring is never about telling people to do `this and that` every time. Many at times, they need to be shown potential possibilities and platforms of becoming successful. For instance, stories come in handy to provide an engaging and exciting working environment established on mutual trust. In essence, leaders may hold back sharing their life experiences, with the fear of familiarity. They miss out on building relationships in addition to polishing their storytelling skills.

Mentoring Expands a Leader’s Perspective

Leaders need to see things clearly and beyond the abilities of regular employees. As such, they need to gather guidance and experience from individuals in various industries. These may include millennials, people with disabilities, and those with more experienced backgrounds in their career fields. The leaders would also learn to appreciate the different views and opinions that such mentors have, with the primary intent of enriching their thinking…

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Four Marketing and Advertising Tactics for New Businesses

New businesses need intense marketing and advertising strategy to attract customers even when they have a strict budget. To stay competitive in the market, some strategies can be utilized. Below are four marketing advertising tactics that can be used to grow the business.

Content Marketing

New businesses rely on content marketing as a major marketing strategy. This involves constructing and broadcasting the right quality information to the target audience. This tactic requires the creation of content that attracts the readers’ or viewers’ attention.

Before marketing content, it is important to ensure there are a clearly defined market audience and information on their needs and desires. Content can be developed from the audience’s possible challenges and the most asked questions. The content should not relay different quality of information that the products or services do not have…

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Rebuilding Your Business From COVID-19 Losses

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Rebuilding Your Business From COVID-19 Losses

Jason Kumpf July 8, 2020 0

No doubt about it, COVID-19 has hammered businesses across the United States and caused great financial damages. The outbreak has forced many businesses to close their doors to stop the spread of the virus. Unfortunately, business owners still have to eat, and this has left them struggling to make ends meet. In fact, the unemployment rate within the United States shot through the roof at 14.7% in April 2020, a new all-time high that has caused harm that will take years to recover from. How can someone rebuild from the damages after COVID-19?

Take Inventory of the Damage

While painful to do, people should take inventory of the damage done to their business. They have to give it a realistic assessment. Update financial statements such as the profits and the losses that have taken place recently. In this way, people will have the ability to compare their numbers from this year and the previous year, which will help them to figure out where to go from there. This can help business owners to figure out how far behind they might be from it.

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Why Consumer Feedback is Essential to Businesses

With such stiff competition in the marketplace, it pays to take advantage of any information about a company’s customers. Consumer data is usually available in two forms: secondary and primary research. However, primary research provides more direct information about customers’ feelings, usage, and reactions to certain products. With that in mind, the following are some reasons consumer feedback is imperative to a company’s success.

Identify Needs and Wants

Consumer feedback allows a business to identify the needs and wants of customers. Often referred to as “hot buttons,” these desires or customer necessities dictate what’s most important to consumers, according to Chron.com. Subsequently, when an organization fulfills these needs and wants, they have a better chance of retaining customers and increasing repeat business.

Serves as Measuring Stick Versus Competition

Feedback from customers shows how companies fare against key competitors. This type of information is usually garnered using rating scales in marketing research surveys to measure the company’s specific attributes and competition. For example, restaurants often measure variables such as food quality, service, and cleanliness. If a particular restaurant rates lower on one of these variables versus competitors, it will know where it needs to improve to get more sales and traffic. Business owners can also identify key strengths versus competitors and use them to their advantage.

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Expanding Your Customer Base

No matter what type of business an individual starts or runs, he or she will need to expand that enterprise’s customer base to succeed. The first step in growing a customer base is to offer a viable product or service that appeals to a broad enough target audience. The business owner will also need to provide those wares at fair prices. With that in mind, the following are the best ways to build a customer base.

Conduct Market Research

Whether a business owner does phone, internet, or in-person surveys, the objective is to determine what styles, flavors, sizes, or features customers want in certain products. The next step would be to make the necessary changes to meet those needs. Similarly, it pays to contact old customers and apprise them of changes to the product or service line. This could help win a certain percentage of them back.

Ask for Referrals

Current customers are always the best source for getting new customers, according to Forbes. Therefore, when a business owner acquires a new customer, he or she should ask the person for referrals. When getting referrals, always ask for the person’s name, address, and phone number. Create a form in advance for the customer to list the referrals.

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Five Great Ways to Expand Your Business

Growing your business is more important than ever, so it’s time to boost your marketing game. Even if you’re not familiar with professional marketing tactics, there are plenty of things you can do to draw more consumers to your business. Here are just a few ideas to help you get started.

Keep Existing Customers

It’s significantly cheaper to spend money on your existing customers than it is to attract new consumers through an advertising campaign. The best way to keep your customers coming back is to create a loyalty program that offers something of value for repeat business. In addition to enticing your existing customers to come back, a good loyalty program will encourage word of mouth advertising, so you can attract new customers at no additional cost.

Create a Partnership

By partnering with another business in your community, you can each access one another’s customer base. However, it’s important to partner with a business that compliments your own, so the partnership will work well. For instance, if you own a car rental business, it might make sense to partner with an auto repair business. You might offer a discount on rentals for customers who are getting their vehicles repaired by your partner business…

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