Competing against established players
I'm curious to know if anyone has specific tactics they are willing to share that they use to compete against established companies in their space. My SAAS is up against some established companies that have decent VC investments. That means I can't compete in areas like advertising, ad spend and PR but I can do other things to help attract traffic and customers.
Right now one thing I'm using quite successfully is to watch social media for unhappy experiences with the competition. When I spot those occurrences I drop a tailored response that steers them towards my solution. It's not scalable but it is quite effective in getting a conversation going with a prospect. It also gets exposure on the persons social sphere.
Interested to see what others are trying.
This isn't really advice for specific tactics, but it's a mindset that really helped me think through all of this with my app.
Having run an app in a similar space, my advice would be to look for ways you can do things that the big companies never could, or at least never would, do. For instance, in most cases, that's really great one-on-one customer service. In other cases, it's simply doing less, but better.
It may sound trite, but "competing" with bigger players isn't the point. You can't compete head-on, so it's important to focus on differentiating yourself from what they do. Finding a niche can help because you can improve your focus and your messaging. The bigger companies, by their very nature, must do everything they can to appeal to a wider audience because they need thousands of tens of thousands of new customers.
Allan Branch had my favorite analogy for this. Less Accounting was competing with QuickBooks and the like. Even though Less Accounting was smaller, it was highly profitable, and so he likened it to being the cockroach of the industry. (Based on the idea that cockroaches would be the only thing to survive nuclear armageddon.) It would be nearly impossible for the big players to kill them off.
Alternatively, in the case of VC, the companies frequently won't last. They're swinging for the fences, and many of them will simply burn hot and bright and then fade away because they can't maintain their growth rate. There are plenty of stories about smaller companies playing the long game and staying profitable. Then, when the larger funded ventrues fall apart, they're there to provide a new home for those customers.
I hope that helps even though it's not specific tactics.
Thanks for the advice. That is pretty much spot on with how I have been thinking, little guys can be nimble (like cockroaches). I do agree that being bootstrapped means there's a greater chance of longevity, maybe not full time, but as long as the business is cash flow positive there's no reason to stop it.
One of the most effective strategies I've seen for breaking into a crowded market with established players is to focus on a niche. Instead of being the "best bug tracker" be the "best bug tracker for construction workers" (not really, but you get the idea).
A great example is ConvertKit, which had to compete with the likes of MailChimp and other huge alternatives. Nathan Barry was struggling to get the business off the ground, but he eventually learned enough about his customers to identify a great niche. He rebranded to "ConvertKit: Email Marketing for Professional Bloggers" and updated his features and marketing strategies to serve that niche. 7 months later he'd gone from $5000/mo to $30000/mo.
This is really hard to do, because it feels like you're cutting out lots of potential customers. But if you can identify a valuable niche, it's really worth it, because if you build a tool specifically for them then (a) they'll like your product way better than anyone else's, and (b) they'll find it much easier, too, and talk to each other about it.
Great advice. I'm starting to zero in on two groups of users that based on my current data use the service more than anyone else. It does feel counter intuitive to steer away from other markets but as you said, it will pay off in the long run.
Hi there dgrigg,
I'm actually sales head for a SaaS in a similar position for private aviation. We have continuously approached the 'big boys' in the space but are always defeated by the established players.
The trick is to find yourself someone like you with a mindset or a team that mirrors your interests.
Create a partnership with a reference to each other. Milk it. Show only the facts. If your industry is flaky, put out a press release and push it to the industry media outlets.
That being said, getting there or reaching that point takes a lot of work and trust, that's why it's easier if your interests are aligned. What's the catch you as a smaller guy can provide that the big guys can't?
The reason that people go with big brands is because they're trusted. The only way to become trusted and seen as a 'big player' in the space is to have a big partner...Or a shit ton of customers.
Having a big partner while you give them a custom solution or premium platform for partnership levels you both up.
It shows their organized and know exactly what they need, and it shows your ability to work with the market.
Make sure everyone knows it was your company. They're then technically pulling you up on their level for clientele at their size. You can also push up to the competitive market with a large customer base, trusted partnership, data no one else has, or some USP's.
Can your platform go free and acquire the little guys?
Go to conferences where customers connect and try to find a director, manager, or C level that has a vision you can align with. If you work with social, you have to be social.