New Kid On The Block — Positioning Yourself to Enter a New Market
The thought of entering a new market can be daunting!
You are starting from scratch while going up against brands and businesses who already have an established footprint in the marketplace. Having a vision you desire to achieve is one thing. The process to execute that vision is a journey that will terrify most.
While no doubt challenging, there are some distinct opportunities you have that can be used as an enormous advantage over your competition when you’re first starting out.
My view is that there is no such thing as a disadvantage, simply an opportunity that hasn’t been leveraged yet.
Offer Less:
“Make every detail perfect and limit the number of details to perfect.” — Jack Dorsey, co-founder of Twitter
Realize that when starting a business in a new market, you are now directly competing with brands and companies who control established market share and generally have a wide offering of products and services. This means that starting on Day 1 you will not have the ability to compete at the volume or efficiency level directly with these companies.
But why should that matter?
By making the commitment to Offer Less, you allow yourself the opportunity to provide your customer simplicity as a value! Leverage your infancy in the market by promoting simplicity as something that the “mature” companies really don’t provide.
Siddharth Bharath makes a compelling case (here) that a more tailored service offering will allow you to provide your client base with a greater customer experience while building brand equity in the market.
We all want more sales, more conversions, more click throughs; but in order to achieve this we have to understand the importance of where we are, not where we want to be.
Tell Me A Story:
Would be you interested in your local Wal-Mart cashier giving you a history lesson on the origin of the company? No, you just want to pay for your Double Stuff Oreos and gallon of milk as
quickly as possible!
Why?
Because as a consumer, we simply have nothing to personally connect with. If you stop shopping at Wal-Mart tomorrow, guess what? Not a single person on their Board of Directors would lose even one second of sleep over it. The hard truth is that to the bigger companies, the individual does not matter.
As the new kid on the block, you have an amazingly unique weapon at your disposal! Leverage it correctly and it has the potential to disrupt the entire market!
YOUR STORY!
In today’s economy, consumers are searching out companies and brands that they can connect with. Consumers are smart, informed, engaged, and willing to share their thoughts with the world. They want to feel invested in the companies they buy from, they want to know that their dollar actually means something. More and more we are watching consumers connect with passion, belief in mission, and the opportunity to be “on the ground floor” right there with you.
Leveraging your story and your “why” provides the ability to directly reach those new customers and give them a feeling of investment in your brand.
Customers are a companies greatest asset, especially when they also serve as their best marketing tool.
Margin — Hit Where It Hurts:
A beautiful part about launching a new business is your ability to stay lean while building your brand and customer base. Your overhead and expenses will pail in comparison to your competition, thus exposing almost every bigger companies Achilles heel, MARGIN!
Employ the leverage of your story while offering a product of equal or greater quality, and you have now positioned yourself in the space to be a threat!
Bigger companies usually can’t get out of their own way. They have drawn out approval processes before they can enact change. Your flexibility will allow to pivot when necessary and react quickly!
As an infant company, one strategy you can afford to take more risk on is pricing intentionally to capture market share. Just looked at what Alibaba did to Ebay!
Jack Ma is the Founder & CEO of Alibaba, world record holder of the largest IPO in history with a current market value of over $500 Billion Dollars.
Alibaba was born out of Jack recognizing a unique opportunity in the online auction market where he could apply his talent and skill set to compete directly with Ebay.
At the time, Ebay controlled over 90% of China’s online purchases. How did he attack this giant?
He offered a service equal in quality but charged no fees or commissions. Ebay refused to change their model to adjust to the competition.
Jack Ma knew Alibaba had to make that sacrifice to establish the brand and prove themselves to customers. As time went on, Chinese customers began leaving Ebay in droves to use Alibaba.
Today Ebay’s market share in China is less than 3%.
