Small businesses may face a particular difficulty in identifying their directly competitive selling channels, not usually in identifying where target buyers buy competitive products.
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Small companies should make a list of any competitors in their marketing area that could compete directly with them for the same list of potential customers. The list of competitors should then be divided into different distribution channels, if applicable.
In the architect example, a list of competitors broken down by different local distribution channels includes:
Architectural competitors who advertise in local city media may be local, regional or national. In some cases, these competitors solicit home design business from wealthy industrial design clients they are doing work for. Other competitors have contracts to design and modify development-tract homes for local developers. And some competitors work with contractors to design home remodeling/addition projects. The local university is active in publicizing student residential design projects that result in several new home and remodeling/addition jobs each year.
The development of a list, broken down into competitive distribution channels, can also be assigned estimated dollar sales per year to create market segments. Sales estimates can be gathered by reviewing secondary research data, networking, and attending trade and association events, and by speaking with local government and business organizations (e.g., chamber of commerce and city, state, and federal housing departments, particularly the agency that issues local building permits).
Next, Life Designs worked on assessing company
strengths and weaknesses, along with external environment opportunities and
threats.