Do You Really Want to be Competitive?

I worked recently with a contractor looking to improve his bottom line, which was suffering mostly because it was costing him too much to produce. As soon as I suggested he needed to bump up his markup, he declared “I can’t raise my prices if I want to stay competitive!”

Now when I hear the word “competition” in a business context, I think of the old gasoline wars of the 50’s with two filling stations offering precisely the same products and services squaring off on opposite street corners and slashing their prices. Or, I think of car dealers and chain stores offering to “match the competition’s prices” on identical products.

If you can’t make what you need by staying within the flock of same product/same service companies, then you have to find a way to be seen as something unique…uniquely valuable.

A Maine company several years ago took out a half page ad in a major periodical and said simply: “We return phone calls.” They’d identified the one thing that drives homeowners and general contractors nuts around here: the failure to receive acknowledgement, much less service. Their stated policy to call people back lifted them out of the crowd, and once you’ve removed yourself from “the competition,” you don’t have to worry about staying “competitive.”

The key to successfully charging more for your services is to make sure you’re delivering unique, superior services! The quality of your customer’s experience will identify you as either a top-notch service provider worth every penny or a price-gouger who delivers run-of-the-mill products. In these times particularly, people place as high or higher value on their time than on their money; they will gratefully pay more for dependability, promptness, and follow-through.

Be exceptional, and there will be no competition.