Small Business Competitive Analysis | Startup Planning Guide

Entering a crowded marketplace without doing a competitive analysis of your competition is like entering a jungle without a flashlight.  Whereas Small Business Competitive Analysis may sound confusing, it’s not.   The Competitive Analysis is simply doing your research on the competition your small business is going to come up against the second you launch.

For example, don’t you want to know what your competition does well?  Don’t you really want to know what they don’t do we, so you can do it better?  Granted, answering these questions is only half the battle, it’s even more important to do something about it.

Small Business Competitive Analysis – Questions to Help Entrepreneurs Compete

Continuing our startup series of questions, this post will focus on analyzing your company’s competition.  This, in addition to your own competitiveness within that industry. If you’re just reading this blog for the first time, thank you for joining.  However, you’re joining us for the fifth installment of an eleven part series.  Each segment focuses on one particular aspect of business so, be sure to check out or other segments.

You can follow you’re place within our series and links to the other segments below:

• Startup Vision, Mission, Goals & Objectives
• Development & Structure
• Market Analysis
• Product & Service Offering
• Competitive Environment
• Strategic Planning
• Marketing & Sales Planning
• Organization Structure & Management
• Operations Planning
• Risk Analysis & Contingency Planning
• Financial Plan

Questions to Test your Competitive Environment:

1. Who are your major competitors?
2. Is the market dominated by a few major players or many players?
3. Identify the strengths and weaknesses of each competitor.
4. Characterize the nature of competition both inside and outside the industry.
5. Describe possible competitive threats and risks.

In addition to answering the above questions, can you think of any other questions to help you analyses your competitive environment?  These questions are just a sample and should spur more within you and/or your team.

The more you know about your competition the better.  The more you know, the better you can compete and ultimately succeed.  Conversely, your competition is doing their research on you.  Be sure to keep your business and startup founding material safe and make sure you don’t have any “lose lips” on the team.

With that in mind, Brandings has everything entrepreneurs need to hit their startup targets every time. We offer a wide range of services including company naming, premium domain names, strategic planning, corporate identity and design, testing and research, trademark screening, all custom tailored to meet all your specific startup needs.

Finally, we’d love to hear what you have to say.  If you have any questions to help analyze your marketplace and competition, we’d love to hear it.  And, we think everyone else will as well!