Beating the competition

EATING your competition is best begun before they enter your market. Swing into action as soon as you hear a new, aggressive owner is taking over an established store or that one of the biggies is looking for a nearby site.

The first step, consultant Joe Samulin advised in one of his store management and aggressive marketing workshops, is to analyze your market and your operation. Ask yourself the hard questions. What are we? Where are we headed? What do we want to be? Whom do we appeal to in our market? What canwe do that we are notdoing to achieve our goals? Be tough. Set your goal to become so successful and so profitable that the competition will hesitate to enter your market.

Storyat a Glance

The second step recommended by Samulin involves your customers. He suggests developing a questionnaire and distributing it to them with a stamped, self addressed envelope for retuming it. Don't ask them to identify themselves, but request sex and age

Ask customers to rate the store on a scale of I to 10 on cleanliness, assortments, displays, ease of finding merchandise. Then ask them to apply the same ratings to your personnel, ranking them on courtesy, helpfulness, appearance, attitude and product knowledge. Next, ask about advertising. Does it attract attention? Are advertised prices attractive? Are the advertised items displayed prominently in the store, in plentiful supply, easy to locate? Do they make other purchases when they come in for advertised specials? Finally, ask if you inventory what they want to buy and what else they would like for you to carry.

Prime the customer's acceptance of the questionnaire and encourage him to return it by including as a thank you a coupon for l0% off on his next purchase or a small gift such as lightbulbs.

If the competition is firmly in place, keeping ahead of it means learning from its successes and failures, business communicators Jacqueline Dunckel and Brian Taylor recommend. They suggest analyzing the competition to learn what it is doing right and wrong. Develop a profile of the competing store with these questions: How long have they been in business? What is their reputation for product/ service? Whatare they doing thatwedon'tdo? Is itattracting more customers for them? If we are both doing the same thing, how can we do it better?

Shop your competition to find out if they really have lower prices, better service, more complete inventory and a more attractive facility. Customers often perceive a store as what it says it is, not what it really is. If you tell the public something, such as "we have the lowest prices," often enough, they'll begin to believe it.

When you know what your customers think of you and how you stack up to your competition, take action. Cutting prices is rarely the answer, but creating the image of being a value added store is. Decide what you do better than your competition and let the public know. Advertise your friendly service, quality products, complete inventory, money back guarantee, free estimates, reasonable delivery, free paint matching, free computer design, special orders, custom service, installation, credit, clinics-whatever sets you apart from your competitor.

Involve all employees. Without them your plan will frzzle. T'hey must understand the reasoning behind your decision to add a new service or institute new policies. Their cooperation and dedication are essential to the effort.

Advertising is not the only way to bring people into your store. Gregrey J. Harris, a marketing specialist and author of Talk is Cheap, suggests giving customers a card to sign and give to a friend entitling the holder to a free gift or discount. In addition to bringing new customers, this will create valuable word of mouth advertising, he points out. Using information available from public records to make special mailings inviting newcomers or new homeowners to come into the store for a gift or discount also works. The old standby freebies of painter's caps, nail aprons, carpenters pencils, yardsticks or rules, calendars, small plants and trees never go out of style.

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