Analyzing your competitors
Lesson 11 from: Brand Marketing Bootcamp: Build An Actionable Marketing PlanScott Lancaster
Analyzing your competitors
Lesson 11 from: Brand Marketing Bootcamp: Build An Actionable Marketing PlanScott Lancaster
Lesson Info
11. Analyzing your competitors
Lessons
The definition of strategy
03:39 2The 4 stages of marketing
03:16 3The difference between strategy & tactics
03:46 4The 6 laws of marketing
09:56 5Understanding Creative & Distribution
02:16 6The 4 marketing P’s and how to use them
05:08 7SWOT Matrix and how to use it
02:28 8Porter's Five Forces
04:4360/40 Law of marketing
04:04 10The marketing funnel
06:27 11Analyzing your competitors
07:14 12Deciding your target audience
06:59 13Creating your marketing objectives
11:42 14Pricing your products perfectly
08:16 15Watch this before arranging your marketing strategy
02:21 16Awareness, finalizing your awareness tactics
03:52 17Partnerships and affiliates (free tactic)
09:40 18Blog writing & SEO
07:26 19Podcasting
07:10 20Public Relations
05:58 21Giveaways
07:18 22Word of mouth
06:21 23Valuable courses
08:09 24Social media overview
05:28 25YouTube
09:36 26TikTok
03:58 27Twitter / X
04:48 30How to create better content in half the time
07:54 33Why start-ups should never use paid advertising for awareness
06:21 34Education & Consideration
01:33 35Workshops & Webinars
08:39 36Social Proof
06:55 37Effective Email Marketing
05:34 38Utilizing FAQ Sections
05:31 39Portfolio & case studies
07:39 40Leveraging product comparisons
03:26 41Tips to increase desirability
07:22 42Harnessing the power of Google reviews
05:20 43Sales & Conversion
02:28 44Psychological tricks to convert customers to buying
08:25 45Building a list of customers ready to buy
08:46 46Irresistible Offer
08:31 47Persuasive Sales Page
07:35 48Promotions & Free shipping
04:24 49Improving conversion rate (PIPE FRAMEWORK)
06:39 50Customer Retention
03:43 51Expanding your product range
07:18 52Asking for feedback & refining your product
03:37 53Loyalty programs and the subscription model
06:43 54Gifts & Surprises
05:02 55Finalizing your marketing strategy
07:40Lesson Info
Analyzing your competitors
So before we start developing our marketing plan, we first need to understand who we are up against in regards to our competition. Now, if you've already completed your brand strategy within the first course of our five step program, then you don't actually need to take this lesson because you've already completed it. But if you haven't taken that course, then do not worry, we're going to cover everything in this lesson so that you know exactly who you're up against and how you can be done. Now, you may be wondering why do we actually need to assess our competition? Well, put it this way, if you were competing in a real with a shark, you'd likely want to compete with them on land and not in the water. Otherwise, they're certainly going to be you and they'll probably eat you afterwards. And to be honest, I'm not sure which is worse. So assessing your competition is super important because it allows you as a brand and as a business to look at who else can your customers buy from and then...
ultimately decide how you can position yourself effectively in the market to give yourself an advantage and what I mean by advantage is I want to give customers a reason to choose my brand and my business above everyone else who they could buy from. And when you look at your competition and you assess their weaknesses and their strengths, you start to develop a much better understanding in regards to how you can effectively compete within that environment. Now, the first step to assessing your competition is you guessed it actually finding your competition online. Now, I suggest looking at and analyzing around 2 to 3 companies just to give you enough information to make the best decisions going forward. And one thing to remember is when you assessing your competition do not ever get disheartened by how far they are ahead of you because this is all part of the game, they've been around for much longer, I'm assuming and you are ultimately looking to steal market share away from them. So it's all part of the game and it's all part of the fund. So do not worry. And plus if you get your marketing strategy, right, which is the exact purpose of this course, then you're never going to have to worry about getting customers because you're going to be able to attract them from those competitors fairly easily. So once you have your competitors, you now need to start researching them, filling in the details on your brand guidelines, worksheets. Now, you can actually find most of the information fairly easily using either Google or Chat G BT. Once you get these more basic pieces of information, you can then start looking into the competitors, target audience and who they are ultimately trying to sell to. And you can usually get a really great taste of the type of person who is buying from or interested in that brand by simply just looking at their followers on social media and people who comment on their content If you spend enough time on their Instagram, Facebook or youtube or wherever else, whatever the platform tickles your fancy, you can find and see the types of profiles, the types of people that are actually interested in the content that they're creating. Therefore giving you an ideal insight into the demographic that are interested in not only their products but also potentially yours. Next, look at their social media following and note down which ones are the biggest so that you know, where you have to work the hardest to basically gain market share or share of voice within that particular the platform. Also note down if they are more premium brand or more affordable, just essentially get as much information as possible in regard to that particular brand so that you can understand them and how they're approaching their marketing and their positioning as effectively as possible. Next, make sure you check their pricing. This is going to be super useful for you because this is going to give you a benchmark for how much you can charge in the market. Because ultimately, if all of your competitors are charging $100 for the exact same product that you're going to be selling, it's going to take something really special to be able to charge more than that because your customers are going to just see your competition and basically choose them if they feel like they're not getting the additional value from you and you're charging a lot more. Now, one thing to remember is when it comes to pricing and ultimately figuring out how much you should be selling your products and services for realize that when you're assessing a company who's been around for maybe one decade, two decades, three decades, even even longer, then the pricing structure that they're using has been tested maybe hundreds of times. And the reality is that you can try and spend an awful lot of money, time and effort figuring out how much someone's willing to pay for a pair of trainers or whatever you're selling. But the reality is if that particular business is selling the product at that price, then you shouldn't steer too far away from that. That is ultimately the price that the market is willing to spend. Obviously, that's just my humble opinion, but it's actually from a really great book called Ready Fire in which if you haven't read already, you should probably read next check their strengths and their weaknesses. Now, obviously, this could be anything this could be that they have a really great Facebook community or that they have just a really strong brand and their weakness could be. They accidentally swore at someone on Instagram or something else that just puts them in a position where they aren't really classed as being very strong. The reason that we're looking at the brand's strengths and weaknesses is we need to highlight where we can invest our efforts. Let me give you an example. So if E brand is absolutely smashing it on Instagram, for example, then we should probably look at the other platforms where they're not as popular to get our share of voice there far more easily. Maybe they aren't as prevalent on Tik Tok and maybe they haven't really kicked up their strategy on Tik Tok just yet. That would be a great opportunity for us to basically take advantage and start growing our audience on that platform before they start to grow their own audience to compete with us. For example, if we wanted to start a video content platform like youtube, then we would have to make it different to youtube because otherwise people would just go to youtube, they'd have no reason to come to us. So we would maybe have to niche down and focus on a very specific niche to give people a reason to levitate towards us. The same goes with any type of business or brand. You need to make sure that you have some reason that the customers going to choose you, whether it be that you're cheaper, whether it be that you're better, whether it be like you're different, whether it be that you add some extra value, which they can't get elsewhere. It's all part of the game. You need to figure that out first before you start to invest too much time and energy into building your product and service. For example, if you were a luxury brand competing with Louis Vuitton, Louis Vuitton has been around for a long, long time and they have a very strong brand pretty much all over the world. Now, how could you compete with Louis Vuitton? You know, if you're thinking outside the box, you can maybe angle it in the way that you are a craftsman, you're a craftsman and an artist with leather, you know, so you make maybe the best belt in the entire world and you're known for making the best belt in the world or maybe you're known for making the best wallet in the world, the wallets that are going to last the test of time and they actually develop character as the leather, you know, kind of matures and cracks and gains gains character over time. Ultimately, it's all down to creating a little story behind your brand and we'll get more to that a little bit later on in the course. But right now, you should start to have at least one competitor fully finished. So work through the others and obviously make sure that you reach out if you need any support in regard to this particular section of the course. I know it can be a little bit new for some people, but I will see you in the next lesson that.
Class Materials
Bonus Materials