Piggyback Marketing: What Your Competitors Don’t Want You to Know

Are you familiar with the sayings, “If it’s not broke, don’t fix it.” or “There is no need to reinvent the wheel”? If a business is already marketing their product or service successfully then why would you want to change that strategy? Simply copy what they are doing (the strategy) and then add in your brand. My suggestion sounds shameless, doesn’t? It sounds like I am saying steal their idea, copy their business model and then laugh all the way to the bank. LOL!

Copy Cat!

Well, that is pretty much what I am saying but not entirely what I mean. In high school if you did not study for the test the night before what did you do? You sat beside the smartest person you could and you piggybacked off of their efforts. Mr. or Mrs. Smarty Pants spent all night studying while you were out partying or playing video games and then like a theif in the night you came and took their hard earned answers. However, what I am suggesting in business is that you study what your competition is doing successfully and then mimic the strategy while using your own personal brand.

Your competition in business has spent the time, the money, and the energy testing different marketing techniques and then after years of trial and mostly error they come up with a few key marketing strategies that enable them to get business and stay in business year after year. If you are starting a small business that you want to grow rapidly into a big business then follow these 7 steps below:

7 Steps to Find Your Competition’s Secrets of Marketing Success

1. Find your Competition – You cannot study who you do not know. Who is offering what you are offering? And do not say no one. You are always in competition regardless of how original you think your idea is.
2. Who Are the Top Competitors – Who has the largest business? Who has the biggest budgets? Who do you think of when you think of your industry?
3. How Are They Advertising - Do they primarily use newspaper, pay-per-click, television, radio, flyers, or word of mouth?
4. Where Are They Consistently Advertising – If month after month, companies are continuing to purchase newspaper ads or radio commercials then you can conclude that they are receiving a return on their investment from those mediums of advertising.
5. How Are They Marketing – Now that you know where they are successfully marketing ask yourself how are they marketing to experience a return? How often? What colors are they using? Do they announce a call to action at the end? Are they running sales? How do they track their return?
6. Run a Test – Once analyzed test your theories cautiously. Do not dump a pile of money into the conclusion that you have made. Proceed cautiously, by investing a little money and then track the return on your investment.
7. Increase Your Investment – Once you find out what method works then all you have to do is increase the amount of money that you spend and you will see that your revenue will increase proportionately.