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The Strategic Sweet Spot

By Becky McCray

By Lisa Van Allen, PhD, ACC

There is no more critical time than now for small businesses to discover their “strategic sweet spot”. Business owners put a considerable amount of time into evaluating the market, selecting a niche, and developing a personal or company brand. These are essential to business success. But the work is not finished until careful analysis has been done to find what products and services your customers need or want that no one else is offering.

Market and competitive analysis is usually done as part of a business planning or strategic planning process. Business owners need to know who else is doing work or selling products similar to theirs. Sometimes the competition is obvious. In health care, it is easy to identify the number of hospitals in a given area. However, deeper analysis must be done to find the smaller clinics and private offices offering services that compete with those done in a hospital or medical center. In the automotive industry, there is also overlap between auto repair shops,“big box” stores, tire stores, and shops offering specialized services (i.e. transmission repair). Knowing your competition is vital as you select services, establish pricing, develop marketing plans, and later consider expansion. It is vital to develop a strong network to keep abreast of what is happening in your market. You can learn much by maintaining friendships within your industry, listening to new employees or potential recruits, and talking to vendors. All this information should be written down for comparative analysis to create a picture of what is happening in your market.

Knowing your customer is equally important. Customer surveys and frequent personal contact will give you opportunity to learn what customers think about your services. Ask your customers how well they like your work or product with the view of learning and improving, and they will share ideas you may have missed. Use caution in asking customers about your competition –you don’t want to remind them of the things they favored there –but you can ask your customer to help you grow and improve. The most important question to ask is, “What products or services do you need or want?” Ask your customer for a wish list or to imagine a perfect world. They might ask for something impossible, but that dream might just spark an idea for an innovative product or service that no one else is offering. You have now discovered a strategic sweet spot. You are in a position to offer something no one else is offering. You will make your current customers very happy, and they will tell their friends.

Think outside of the box when looking for a strategic sweet spot. Your competition and customers vary in different contexts. If you start by looking at a market location or certain demographic, then you might shift to looking at specific niches within your industry (i.e. technology used in your field, automated processes, customer service innovations). Your strategic sweet spot may be something you are already offering or might be a new product or service yet to be developed. Either way, a strategic sweet spot gives you a competitive edge that will strengthen and expand your bottom line.

Photo provided by Lisa Van Allen


Lisa Van Allen, PhD, ACC is the Conscious Business Coach who helps small business owners and entrepreneurs blend Purpose and Passion with Profit.

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About Becky McCray

Becky started Small Biz Survival in 2006 to share rural business and community building stories and ideas with other small town business people. She and her husband have a small cattle ranch and are lifelong entrepreneurs. Becky is an international speaker on small business and rural topics.
  • Downtown is your town’s core: How to make your case - February 22, 2021
  • Zoom Towns: attracting and supporting remote workers in rural small towns - December 10, 2020
  • In an economic crisis, spend your brainpower before your dollars - November 25, 2020
  • Video: How to fill empty car dealership buildings for the holidays - November 6, 2020
  • How has 2020 changed the challenges rural small towns face? Tell us here - October 20, 2020
  • The Idea Friendly Method to surviving a business crisis - October 6, 2020
  • Join me for the Rural Renewal Symposium online Oct 13 - September 26, 2020
  • Cheap placemaking idea: instant murals - September 11, 2020
  • Refilling the rural business pipeline - July 7, 2020
  • Huge vacant buildings: grants to renovate? - June 9, 2020

November 9, 2008 Filed Under: entrepreneurship

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Comments

  1. PizzaForADream.com says

    November 10, 2008 at 2:44 am

    Great post! I have found myself a “strategic sweet spot” in the last year that I’m furiously working to exploit! This is the easiest selling I’ve ever done as our concept is literally selling itself!

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