Who Is Your Competition? Why Your Marketing Strategy Shouldn't Start There

This question was posed to me twice in the past week as a way to engage me in a sales conversation. It struck me because it once again highlighted how differently we at Splash Social Marketing approach strategy.

One person used competition as the pain point leading into their sales pitch. The gist was that they would research your competition and provide a load of data showing what they're doing so you can match and exceed it.

The other person asked me who my competition was and didn't seem sure how to move forward when I answered that I don't have any. His strategy was also to look at your competition and show you how to sell against it.

He asked me to explain how I don't have competition, so I did.

I'm not being cocky when I say I have no competition. I simply don't view other businesses in my industry as competitors. There are no other Toms or Jacquies out there. No one is going to work with clients in exactly the same way we do. And we don't hesitate to refer someone elsewhere when we believe another agency may be a better fit for a potential client.

Of course, I understand the value in knowing what others in your industry are doing and how they're marketing. Competitive research can be useful. But I don't agree that it should be our starting point.

I believe we should start with who the client is and why they started their business.

Why does your business exist? Why did you start it? Who are you trying to help? What have you learned along the way? What matters to you about the way you serve your customers? What do you want people to understand about your business that they may not understand yet?

Those answers tell me far more about how we should market your business than knowing what your competition posted last Tuesday.

Once we understand those things, then we can look outside.

We can look at your industry. We can look at what other businesses are doing. We can see what customers are being told, where opportunities exist and where your business fits into the larger picture.

But there's an important distinction.

Your competition shouldn't define your strategy.

If we start by studying everyone else and asking how we can do what they're doing better, our strategy becomes a reaction to theirs. They become the reference point. And before long, everyone in the industry starts looking and sounding remarkably similar.

We've all seen it.

The same kinds of websites. The same social media posts. The same phrases. The same promises. The same trends being repeated because someone saw someone else doing them.

And now that AI has made it easier than ever to create content quickly, I think the temptation to do this is only going to grow.

But your competition can't tell us who you are.

They can't tell us why you started your business. They don't have your experiences. They haven't had the conversations you've had with your customers. They don't have your employees, your relationships, your personality, your history or your perspective.

Those are things no competitor can duplicate.

That's also why I don't spend much time worrying about another marketing company becoming "the competition."

There are plenty of businesses that offer social media management. There are plenty that build websites, create videos, handle SEO or offer marketing strategy.

But there aren't any other Toms and Jacquies.

The way we listen, the questions we ask, the things we notice and the relationships we've built over the years all affect the work we do. Another agency will bring its own experiences, people, strengths and perspective to the table.

And that's a good thing.

The goal shouldn't be for every business to figure out how to beat everyone else at being the same.

The goal should be

to understand what makes your business worth knowing.

This is a big part of what we've been putting into words lately at Splash Social Marketing with what we call Branded Story Strategy.

Branding helps people recognize your business.

Branded Story Strategy helps them understand it.

It's about discovering the stories, experiences, values and perspectives that already exist inside a business and figuring out how to communicate them consistently. Not manufacturing a clever story because marketing says you need one. Not looking at a competitor and figuring out how to tell their story better.

Your story is already there. So maybe "Who is your competition?" isn't the first question we should be asking.

Maybe we should start with a much more important one:

Who are you?

Because once we understand that, we can build a strategy around something your competition can never duplicate.