In a marketplace where a consumer can find countless options for absolutely anything, many businesses find themselves asking the same question: how do I set myself apart? Once you have a quality product or service, every business should most likely consider how to reach their target audience in the most effective way possible. To do that, you can make a plan on how to stand out in a saturated market. Below are a few ways to do just that.
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Make Your Product and Service Unique
The most obvious way to stand out among the competition is to focus on your products and/or services. Look at similar businesses and find something they may be lacking. This could be offering to a different market or adding a feature that your competitors do not have. Consider making a smaller version of your product or research another way to make your product more portable or service easier to access when your customer is traveling, such as creating an ecommerce platform. What is ecommerce? It is when a product or service can be bought and sold online between businesses and consumers. You could also take a base product and include an additional product that complements the original. Another way to make your product stand out is to make the product larger or find a way to include more than a competitor for the same price. Improve the longevity of the product by improving the quality. If you can prove that your product is of better quality for a similar price range, that can definitely make you different than your competition. Think of your customer and find ways to personalize your product or give them options to personalize it.
Be Honest
With all of the resources available to consumers today, it can be important to remember that a lack of honesty and transparency will be exposed. With other consumers making a living reviewing products, the Better Business Bureau, and other public information your company must share, the consumer will get the truth even if it does not come from you. But by sharing the truth and being as transparent as possible, you can actually gain customers and draw them towards your product or service and away from others. By being honest, you gain trust and if a consumer trusts you they are more likely to buy from you. The idea of the “informed consumer” is becoming more and more popular so you can use that to your advantage.
Share Your Story
Every company or business has a personal story about how it originated. Because of how customers appreciate authenticity, it can be extremely effective to share your own unique origin story to stand out among your competition and connect with the consumer. When consumers are faced with an influx of advertisements and flashy graphics, being authentic and creating a real connection with a customer can start a lifelong relationship. You can do this by sharing your story and clearly communicating your mission as a business. You are answering not only the “what” but also the “why.” Why you do what you do can make a consumer look twice at your business and your product and/or service.
Create a Community
If you look at extremely successful companies, they are typically more than just a provider of a service or product. They have built a brand and with that brand, they have built a community of consumers that personally identify with their company. If you sell camping gear, you can easily create a logo that can become synonymous with the large community of campers and hikers you are attempting to connect with and sell to by going beyond just marketing towards them. You can create online forums for people with similar interests to connect on or you can offer online resources for hikers to find new trails. By investing in something that indirectly leads a potential customer to your business, you are investing in something that has longer pay-offs than a typical ad campaign.
The potential keys to standing out are creativity, authenticity, and honesty. Also, try to remember to be accessible to your customer. Standing out isn’t as hard as you think.