We are facing global competition, the likes of which we have never seen.

As a smaller business owner, you not only have to worry about competing against the business down the street, but the business across the world.

Many business owners are seeing that first hand. The fact is that you can’t afford not to pay attention to the competition and attempt to outrun them.

You need to keep on your toes. You are not only competing based on product, but on service as well. How you treat your customers and clients matters.

And don’t forget that you need to market your business online, each day and every day. And you have to show up on social media. Unfortunately, many business owners cycle between being present and being absent on social media. They will show up for a few weeks and then all of a sudden, they disappear for a few weeks.

People pay attention to how interactive and responsive you are.

If you are not on top of things, that will cause people to look elsewhere.

Here are 3 quick tips to help you excel against your competition:

1) Offer a better experience

Do you offer a product or a service? Whatever you sell, you have an opportunity to deliver an experience. You can make the process more enjoyable. That will encourage people to buy again.

What can YOU do to improve the experience people have when they buy from you?

2) Create leverage so you can reach more people more quickly and more responsively and more often

There are only so many hours in the day. There are only so many people you can talk to or meet with. At a certain point, you need to create leverage if you hope to reach more people.

Email is a great way to create leverage. You can write one message and then send it to thousands of people. Of course, you need an email list and you need to build your email list.

Video gives you an easy way to talk and share a message. Once you record a video, you can post it online and then share it. Plus, people searching based on your keywords will find your video and watch it.

Like most strategies, you will benefit from doing this consistently over time. Can you commit to recording one video per week? Or even once per month?

Finally, social media is one of the most powerful ways to reach people these days. But, you can’t have a non-stop stream of promotional messages. You need to add value and engage in conversations.

3) Create content that adds value

One of the best ways to get your message out there and attract people is to create content. Write blog posts and articles. Post videos. Create content and post it quickly. And then share it and share it often.

The good news is that your competition has the same challenges you do. They have obstacles that slow them down from time to time.

If you expect to win, in the form of being able to stay in business, do what you want and earn enough income to live on and then some, then you need to spend some time working on how to overcome your competition.

This is worth the effort. By the way, compare yourself to where you were in the past. It’s more helpful to evaluate your performance against yourself than against your competitors.

It’s important to keep a positive attitude. You will feel better knowing that you have progressed and made improvements in your results.

Rick Cooper
Online Marketing and Social Media Trainer