Add A Section For Competitors

Create an area within your community for people that use your competitor’s products.

Search for people on Google, Facebook and Twitter. Invite them to join and run this competitor division of your community. Don’t try to sell them, don’t spam their accounts or force them to do anything different.

You want your competitor’s customers to like your customers. You want that like to become trust. You want your competitor’s customers to envy the established community and want to become a bigger part of it. They want to participate in more activities, discussions and be treated the same as other members.

Side note: Any organisation that hasn’t started building a community amongst their customers might want to start now. Or you might do it for them.

Comments

[Oliver George]

Hi Richard

There are traditional arguments for avoiding naming or drawing attention to competitors when marketing your product. User generated content does address some of these problems.

For example publishing a competitor comparison chart on your website can drive potential customers to your competitors. On top of this it's hard to keep accurate and is unlikely to be trusted. Ultimately it can cause conflict and do more harm than good.

I like the idea of encouraging discussion of competitors in a community

1. Comparisons are likely to present your product in a positive light

2. Comparsions will be seen as relatively unbiased as they come from users not you.

3. It introduces potential clients to your community demonstrating that your product is loved and therefore less risky to buy.

What are the downsides? Drawing attention to competitors, giving unhappy users a soapbox to vent once they've switched to a "better product". That sounds a little scary but if you don't have a unique selling proposition you shouldn't be selling!

cheers,
Oliver George

http://www.linkedin.com/in/olivergeorge

[John Norris]

Further:

Customers are looking for solutions to their problems. Sometimes the competition's product/service truly is the best for that customer. You want the customer to go in that other direction.

If the customer knows they can come to you, or your community, first to get the solution to their problem, you may reap the rewards. That is when the customer trusts you.

John Norris