10 Helpful Things Your Competitors Can Teach You

Last updated on February 23, 2021

Competition is one of your greatest assets when building a business. Rarely are we ever innovators within our industry. Someone somewhere has always done it first. Learn to take that experience, study it, and leverage it for your own success. In this article we’ll cover 10 things your competitors can teach you to improve your business.

1. How to price your services

One of the trickiest parts of maintaining a successful business is getting your pricing right. It’s important to know your value and cover your business costs, but you also have to remain competitive. Which means knowing what your competition is charging for services similar to yours.

There’s more to competitive market research than simply finding the average price and marking yours lower. Look deeper into both how they price their services, and the quality of those services compared to yours. If they have less-than-great media and lackluster reviews, then you can feel more confident with pricing your service higher than theirs.

2. How to design your website

Having an easy-to-navigate and clean website that attracts the eyes of potential clients is crucial for your business. Find websites from other people in your same industry to gain ideas for your own site.

On each site:

• Note your first impression. What was your first thought upon opening the site? Notice how fast it loaded, how it made you feel, and what grabbed your attention. 55% of visitors spend less than 15 seconds on a page, so a good first impression is key.
• Find out how they are hosting their site. WordPress, Squarespace, and Bandzoogle are all popular options for web hosting and self-management. You can usually discover this by looking at the bottom of their site’s homepage.
• Examine the content/general layout. Browse their menus, looking through each page to see what information they have and how they organized it. Determine which elements you do and don’t like.
• Learn their booking process. How are they using their site to collect leads and finalize bookings? Check out their contact form and how easy it is to fill out as well as what questions they’re asking.

3. What media you should have

Having high-quality media is essential to bringing in more clients. Especially in the events industry. Search out the media on your competitors’ online profiles, social media, and website to see what kind of things they have posted. Note which stuff catches your eye or makes you want to click to see more. If you’re looking on social media, find the images or videos that have the most likes, views, or comments.

Video in particular is becoming increasingly important in hooking in new clients. See what kind of videos are being used most by others in your industry. For example, are live video performances more popular or is the focus on promotional videos? When you see a video you really like, try to learn more about what equipment or editing tools they might have used to make it. Can’t figure it out? You could always just ask.

4. What more you can offer

Your competitors may be offering some services or different performance elements that you haven’t considered before. You never want to copy someone else exactly, but seeing what all they do may inspire you to think outside the box as you continue developing your own business.

You can look over the full list of services on their website and online profiles. But even better than that is reading feedback from past clients. Reviewers often detail the specific things that made their event a success and what they liked most that the vendor provided. Be sure to look at reviews across multiple sites to get a more accurate picture. Then figure out what you can possible take and apply to your own business.

5. How to build client relationships

In order to grow as a business, you need clients. And to be successful, you must have a great relationship with them. This is another area where you can learn a lot from your competitors. Research how they communicate with and treat their clients, and even more importantly, how those clients respond.

Things to look for:

• Contact preferences. How do clients reach them? See what contact info they share and which channels they encourage clients to use. Maybe you can offer something different. We recommend being flexible to communicate however the client prefers.
• Customer-first practices. In what ways do they prioritize their clients? Read up on any guarantees they might offer or how they handle issues. Then figure out what you can do that would be even better to set you apart from the competition.
• Read reviews. Do they reply to reviews from past clients? Learning how a competitor handles reviews can be really helpful in developing your own best practices. Use them to learn how you should and should not handle both negative and positive feedback.
• Observe social interactions. How do they talk to clients online? Dig into the comments on your competitors’ social media posts to see if and how they are interacting with their followers. Decide if you feel their approach is positive or negative and then adjust your own accordingly.

6. How to use your social media

You can learn a lot about your competition by checking on their Facebook or Twitter profiles. Do they have more followers than you? More interactions? If so, look closely at the way that they’re interacting with their fans or potential clients.

Apps like Sprout Social or Hootsuite will even allow you to compare your social media pages to competitor’s profiles. Creating private lists on Twitter can also help you keep an eye on your competitor’s posts. Make note of those posts that get the most attention and what may have caused that to happen. The time of day, the day of the week, and any media that was used can all play a role in a post’s success.

7. How to use email marketing

Email marketing is a great and reliable way to keep in touch with past clients, fans, and those who are curious about what you do. If your competitors use a mailing list, sign up for it. By doing so, you can get an inside look at their marketing efforts, pricing, and sales that are being offered.

When examining your competitor’s emails, pay attention to the content they use. Most email lists include exclusive content, promotional offers, or some kind of entertainment that keeps fans subscribed. The substance they add to their emails can offer great insight into their success and give you some ideas for your own email campaigns.

8. How to plan ahead

The events industry sees a lot of dips and peaks due to the changing seasons and certain holidays, so it’s important to know how to plan ahead. As you move through the year, pat attention to how your competitors are adjusting their marketing techniques to accommodate seasonal changes. You can do this by following their social media and joining their email list.

You can also look at any publicly shared calendars to see how far out your competitors are booking events, especially around holidays. This article may be about learning from them, but they are still your competition. Don’t let them scoop up all the best gigs because you didn’t start booking early enough.

9. How quickly you should respond to leads

We find that those who respond to leads fastest often get the gig. If your competitors have a Top Performer status on GigSalad, then they’re responding to at least 80% of their leads within 24 hours. Facebook also displays a response rate on business profiles so you can see how responsive they are on social media.

Ideally, you want to respond to requests as quickly as possible. But most importantly, it just needs to be quicker than your competition. Once you get a feel for how fast others are responding, you can adjust your own approach to try and get a head start.

10. What not to do

A lot of what we’ve covered has been about figuring out what your competitors do right. But it’s equally important to identify what they do wrong. Which is a lot more fun, since after all, they are your competition. But here’s the kicker – you must also acknowledge that you might be doing the same things and be ready to improve.

As you’re researching each of the things mentioned in this post, look for the positive and the negative and learn from both. If you see a marketing technique or social media post that just falls flat, you can assume the same would be true if you tried it.

Being able to truly gain something from your competition requires an open mind and a bit of humility. You must be willing to admit that their way might be better or that they could know more than you in some areas. So check your ego at the door and start learning!