Tweet

10 Things Franchisees Should Know About Their Competitors

Guest post by: Ed Teixeira

Article Overview: Market analysis is a means of gathering important information about your market competitors. It gives you insight into the quality and techniques of your competitors and enables you to understand your market conditions. When you analyze your competitors, indentify the similarities and differences between their products or services and yours. When you’ve identified key characteristics of your competitors you can establish a plan to compete.

10 Things Franchisees Should Know About Their Competitors

Market analysis is a means of gathering important information about your market competitors. It gives you insight into the quality and techniques of your competitors and enables you to understand your market conditions. When you analyze your competitors, indentify the similarities and differences between their products or services and yours. When you've identified key characteristics of your competitors you can establish a plan to compete. For example, you may lower certain prices, offer better service, advertise, use special promotions or add to your product line or services. During your research of your marketplace, you can gather information from competitors that can provide you with insight on what makes them successful (or not!).

You should collect the following information: 1. Who are your competitors?

2. Where are they located?

3. What products or services do they offer?

4. What is their pricing

5. Estimated revenue?

6. Do they advertise? Where?

7. How do they market? (Informational sessions, direct mail, etc.?)

8. What are the perceived strengths and weaknesses of your competitors?

9. What type of equipment and software are they using?

10. Review competitors' websites, literature, and marketing materials - how do they present themselves to the market; are they a professional organization?

Sources of Information:

On-Site: Make visits to your competitors or shop them for services and pricing. You can you use your employees or friends to do competitive checks.

Internet: The Internet can be a great source of information. Enter the competitor's name in search engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN, Ask, etc.) and check out the results of the search. The Internet can give you an overview of your competitor's services, products, and maybe even prices and referral sources. You can gather this information without having to leave your computer. Information is available from the Federal Commerce Department online or in the library. You can review Edgar Online and business websites to obtain required financial filings. Look for an industry trade association and industry publications. Go to Hoovers Online or Bacon's to look for business publications in your industry.

Competitor: During your research of your marketplace, you can gather information from competitors that provides you with insight on what makes them successful (or not!).

Networking: Join community and civic groups. It's a great way to network and meet other business people (maybe even a competitor or two). Determine the business in the market that could be future referral sources and/or clients.

After the information has been collected and your competitive research completed, you will be able to describe your competitors and their strengths and weaknesses. You should know what is different about your business and why customers will choose you rather than your competitors'. You should also be able to describe your target market and target customer and what will motivate them to purchase your product. This process should help you gain and maintain a competitive advantage

© 2010 FranchiseKnowHow, LLC

Related Articles
  Franchisees and The 90 Day Window
  Top Ten Questions To Ask When Exploring Franchises
  Franchising Your Business Should Not Be Smoke and Mirrors
  Negotiating the Terms of Your Franchise Agreement
  About 60% of all franchise opportunities have less than 50 units.
  Aid That Franchisors Provide to Franchisees
  Franchise Marketing Plan
  What makes a franchise successful?
  Franchise Owner To Be? 18 Questions To Ask Current Franchisees
  6 Attributes of Franchise Systems Worth Investing In
  Questions to Ask a Franchisor When Buying a Franchise
  Evaluating the franchisor
  FRANCHISE - A PARTNERSHIP - YOU BET
  Ethical franchising
  Do You Have the Right Stuff to be a Franchise Owner
  Handling Explosive Growth
  FranchisorFranchisee Relationship
  Biggest Issues Potential Franchisees Need To Consider
  The Laws of Franchising Remain Unchanged
  Effective franchise marketing

Article Tags: franchisees, important information, market competitors, similarities and differences



Related Forum Posts
Re: Congress To Make eBay A Rat -- Good Idea or Bad Idea?? - Hi GT, I agree with you. Competitors can use this against each other which is not good for business
Re: SEO... - 1: Find the Best Keywords 2: Discover Your Competitors 3: Optimize Your Title 4: Optimize Your META Tags 5: Use Headings 6: Use Title and ALT Attributes 7: Nomenclatures 8: Create a Site Map Page 9: Include a robots.txt File 10: Install a sitemap.xml for Google MySQL/Oracle:
How to Make Management Profile? - Here are some tips to make a management profile which helps to attract lenders to invest in your business: 1- Tile i.e. Name of the Business 2- Legal structure of the company 3- When did it start its operation? i.e. DD/MMM/YYYY 4- Shareholders and Directors detail (if any) i.e. Name of shareholders, No. of shares and its percentage 5- Name of the Board of Directors Name and short brief about them 6- Current Manpower i.e. in numbers 7- Management and their short profile i.e. name, designation, experience and qualification 8- What services you are offering? Write it down. 9- Your Competitors 10- Main clients or Targeted clients
Re: Seth Godin: Star Fish v Long Tail - Thanks for sharing, David. I always enjoy the interest it brings me when I read these types of things. Things that make you think to consider other possibilities, no matter how obvious they may seem. Cheers, Emma
Re: What is your biggest challenge? Today? - The Big challenge i face many days, is the challenge to stay on schedule. Things always pop up, like family plans and social gatherings. I always end up procrastinating. I've heard it's a very common situation, so does anyone have a resolution to that?


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

How do I finance a franchise?

Winning Market Share in a Tough Economy

Pay Per Click Advertising

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.