Don't You Wish the Competition Would Just Go Away?

By now, all the "there's plenty of room for everyone" and "competition is healthy" proponents have gone home, or they're broke, or both. So what's left are the fighting few. And they're fighting. Every business is busier fighting competition and price than they are answering the phone from interested prospects.

And all of you are hoping for some miracle answer. Well, there is one. But it takes some understanding to get there. And after this short piece you still may not get it. It's subtle and requires more work than you're doing now. The reward is that sales will become easier to come by.

Take a look at the options for dealing with the competition and you'll get a clearer picture. You all know the options: over, under, around and through - well almost.

Consider these:

1. Around the competition. Getting around the competition requires connections, inside information and stealth tactics. Not to mention a bit of masterful political play. OK, OK, it's manipulative. And borders on sneaky. You have to pull a move to get the business. Is that bad? Depends. To get the order, no. To get future orders is where the depends comes in. Depending on your around tactics, you may have gained a poor reputation.

2. Under the competition. Bad strategy. All bad. Undercut them by lowering your price? A one-time win where everyone loses. Low profits. Market deterioration. And the next-lowest price wins the same way. Cheap crowns to cheap dentists is a recipe for bankruptcy.

3. Through the competition. Fighting has its place. And sometimes a fight will produce a win. Tenacity is great, but beating them down by talking trash is a losing position. Our industry is too small for this kind of garbage, and it has no class. But fighting the good fight is a good philosophy. Sales is often a fight. But too often a fight for no reason. Some of the fight is based on the dreaded fear of loss, or desire to gain, rather than the less combative one preferred by the customer: desire to help.

Hint: You may also go inside the competition. Learn all you can about their strengths and weaknesses. This is especially needed for product sales. In a laboratory like mine for example, I’m 100 percent mail order, so I can’t compete on service, I must win with a product my competition doesn’t offer, or to make mine better!

4. Over the competition. This is the ideal way. It assumes that you take the high ground. Now don't get me wrong. It doesn't mean sit back and wait. It means rise above in a way that the competition has to respond or lose. Here are a few over ways:

    * E-zine (JDT Unbound etc).
    * Seminars
    * Referrals (See last month’s column here.)
    * Build value by building profit.
    * Earn testimonials and use them to get over again. Others speaking on your behalf is better than any sales pitch against someone else.

I'll make you one promise: If you invest the time and effort it takes to go over the competition, you will be rewarded beyond your wildest dreams, and sales will be easier and more fun. And once you reach a high level of over you will be qualified for the highest level. The Internet is a great way to build name recognition.

4.5 Ignore the competition.

I have spent the last 25 years going over the competition. Building my own skills and writing. Sales and competition share the same adage: It's not who you know, it's who knows you. Sounds a bit stuffy, but let me assure you that it's better to build your skills than to try to beat someone. I go for best, not beat. It's a better, cleaner win. Do I always win? No, but I always feel I should have. And I have self-confidence that keeps me ready for the next opportunity. And I wake up the next day and go to work sharpening my skills.

I'm not giving you a simple solution as I usually try to do. Rather I'm presenting facts and philosophy and letting you make your own decisions about how you want to handle the competition. Some of you reading this will think that my way (over) is foolish, idealistic or worse - not do-able. That will only help the people you want to beat. The competition.

My ways of dealing with my competition (over or ignore) are the hardest ways - but they work. And the longer you go over them the more you can ignore them.

Yes, I want to beat the competition - it's instinctive. But a smarter path is to have them looking over their shoulders to see where you are. Let them hear your footsteps and beat them by being chosen or preferred.

When a prospect picks you over the competition, it's a day to celebrate and a day to discover why. When you figure out why you were chosen, all you have to do is repeat the process.