Do you feel it’s important to pay attention to what your competition is doing?

Maria Garnier Operations Coordinator en Socialatom Group

October 9th, 2016

They say keep your friends close but enemies closer.

Jeffrey Pearl Entrepreneur, CEO and Sales Leader

October 9th, 2016

Absolutely! That knowledge is important when competing out in the market. You must be "The Expert" in the space, that includes knowing what is available and what others are focusing on. This will help you develop your sales pitch.

Arthur Lipper Chairman of British Far East Holdings Ltd.

October 9th, 2016

It is not important. It is vital.

Glenn Donovan Vice President of Sales (fractional)

October 10th, 2016

I have to say that I was kind of surprised to see this question as it telegraphs such a naive approach to business.

Here's a hint for you. Before you build anything, you should do a competitive analysis of your target market. This should include all direct competitors as well as alternatives and substitutes. You should also map out how the competition messages to your market and then analyze why you are different/better.

I've done these kind of workshops several times for startup SaaS companies and I'm amazed by how many don't even understand their competition. This is like trying to make bread without ever bothering to learn how to knead dough. It's fundamental to any successful strategy.

Once this analysis is done, then one can create what I call "Power Positioning" which is messaging that is designed to put your competition on defense.

My advice? If you are asking this question, you have no business starting a company or launching a new product. Instead, get a job with a well run company and get some experience.

Sorry if this seems rough, but competing and winning is rough. The sooner you figure that out, the better of you will be.

Tom DiClemente Management Consulting | Interim CEO/COO | Coach

October 10th, 2016

Not so important, you will simply kill your company if you don't!

Zilvinas Binisevicius CTO at Baltijos informacines sistemos

October 25th, 2016

Yes, absolutely! You need it to understand your market.

But to be honest, once we've made a product, based on potential customers requirements and visions only. We investigated competitors from business perspective but never looked into competing products. After alpha version was complete we checked all the competing products in details and made minor adjustments of our product. Probably it was a luck, but this approaced alowed us to have absolutely different solution for the problem. And it worked.

John Hall

October 27th, 2016

Hi Maria,

To paraphrase Jeff Bezos: Know your competition, but obsess about your customers.

Danish Want Sr. Consultant - CRMNEXT

October 27th, 2016

To keep a close eye on your founders is very important as it help you to know what all your competition is doing and what you will have to do to take the lead. You will always have to find ways to kill the competition.