Want to read a really great book? It’s got everything: drama, conflict, mysteries, and, most of all, uplifting success stories. It’s the Yellow Pages, and it’s one of the greatest business textbooks available.
An afternoon leafing through the local phone book provides a master class in positioning, the art of distinguishing – or failing to distinguish – your business from others.
In my opinion, the key to positioning is to never compete. That’s right; the best way to beat the competition is by refusing to compete with them. Consider the wisdom of this Grateful Dead bumper sticker: “They’re not the best at what they do. They’re the only ones who do what they do.” Likewise, uniqueness should be the objective of every entrepreneur.
When reviewing the Yellow Pages, you’ll see how ad size, images and language work together to produce an impression of each business. But you must also recognize that a company’s very existence suggests they are doing something right. Many small business owners dismiss the competition based on their shortcomings, but this is shortsighted. It’s better to give careful consideration to what your competition is doing well.
However, if careful consideration turns to obsession, you’re in really big trouble. Companies that obsess over the competition, reacting to every move, aren’t competing at all. Rather, they are ensuring parity. Our current political process is a pretty good example: when the candidates focus on each other they succeed only in dividing the nation. Granted, attacking the competition can be an effective strategy for an inferior company with an insufficient value proposition, but it’s an expensive treadmill and such companies eventually succumb to their more innovative competitors.
Innovation springs from listening to customers. In addition to frequent chats with regular customers, one should also interview new customers to learn why they chose you. Even if you already know all the reasons a customer might prefer your products or service, it’s important to hear it in their own words, because their language makes the most effective advertising copy.
A hostile newspaper interviewed a Kinko’s marketing executive when we were opening a new store in a small community. The paper had already run editorials comparing us to Wal-Mart and claiming we would decimate local businesses. Knowing what he was facing, my friend brought phone books from a dozen similar communities where Kinko’s already had long-established branches. Each book featured pages and pages of print and copy shops. “There’s always a way to succeed,” he told the paper, pointing out that Kinko’s also started with one small store. “You’re either in business for the customers or you’re in business for yourself. If you’re in business for the customers, you don’t have to fear competition.” I agree. Businesses do not fail because the competition beat them, but because they failed the customer.