1 June Making Your Business Stand Out Against a Large Competitor June 1, 2021 By sma Business Tips, Marketing business growth, motivation, small business 0 MAKING YOUR BUSINESS STAND OUT AGAINST A LARGE COMPETITOR June 1, 2021 | Business Tips, Marketing | business growth, small business, motivation By Bill Erickson, NPI, Inc.'s Executive Vice President As a small business owner, you’ll be going up against competition of all sizes as you work to grow and achieve the goals you’ve set for yourself. While you might have the confidence that you can take on companies closer to your size, it can be intimidating to try and tackle a larger, more established firm. But that doesn’t mean you should shy away from the challenge completely. Here’s what you can do to take on the “giants” in your industry. Get Your Name Out An easy way that you can get started with growing your business is getting your name out to as many potential clients as you can. Attend open houses, stop by real estate offices, work your social media profiles, and give out fliers or business cards advertising your name and company. For instance, a great way to spread the word about your new franchise is to attend community events. You’ll make lots of new connections and people will get to know you on a more personable level. Putting a face to your name helps break the ice with clients so that they’ll be more likely to remember you. Give the Best Customer Service Once you’ve built up a strong network of potential clients, the challenge then becomes working to keep them coming back to you. Giving a wide range of services at the best value is only one part to creating return customers. In addition to what you offer, customers remember how you treat them. One negative experience could be cause enough for them to look somewhere else for their needs. Remember to treat everyone as an individual and not just another paycheck. Build Your Reputation In addition to giving great customer service, you need to start tracking the responses you get from clients. Word of mouth is one way to reach more customers, but online reviews go one step further. People can rate your business and comment on what they like or dislike about it. When someone searches up your business, they’ll easily be able to see what they can expect working with you. Work to gather as many reviews as you can to help build your reputation, and draw in more clients. Be Efficient The most valuable asset to anyone is their time, and time efficiency is something you’ll need to balance as an entrepreneur. You can catapult yourself to the front by offering quicker turnaround times to your customers than maybe your competition can. Customers will notice how you value them and remember that when considering working with you later. But it’s important to note the difference between efficiency and rushing. If you go too fast, it can lead to errors and overall sloppy work. Your customers won't care how fast you completed a job, only that you got it incorrect. Develop a working rhythm in your business to increase your productivity. Duplicate Yourself One attraction of larger businesses is the size of their staff. They’re able to handle more accounts and deal with issues customers may have. You definitely don’t need a large staff, but simply adding a few workers can give you a boost. Look for employees that have ambition, are responsible, and are easily coachable. They’ll understand your goals and want to help you and your business succeed. Duplicating your values in another worker will cut down on variations in your service, giving your customers the peace of mind that they know what they’re getting. Have Confidence Above all, being confident in yourself that you can compete with large companies is half the battle. It may be slow going at first, but believing in yourself and staying consistent will get you the momentum you need. Continually push yourself each day, and you’ll start to take off before you know it! Interested in starting your own NPI franchise? Contact us today. National Property Inspections has the tools to help you succeed in the property inspection business. Give us a call today at 402-333-9807 to learn more! About the Author Bill Erickson, Executive Vice President With more than 30 years of experience in marketing and sales management, Bill has created many of the NPI diversified marketing programs. On a daily basis, Bill handles customer relations and provides marketing training and support to franchisees. Outside of NPI, Bill and his wife, Julie, enjoy entertaining friends and family at their 1890’s Victorian Queen Anne home where there always seems to be another renovation project underway. Comments are closed.