Analyze the Competitive Landscape

It’s impossible to position yourself and your services effectively if you don’t know what other options your prospective clients are considering. Whether you’re building a brand, writing marketing copy, or trying to figure out how to stand out in a proposal, you need to know the competitive landscape to gain consideration from prospective clients.

Because the world is constantly changing, you’ll want to return to these principles whenever there’s a big change in your market, services, or clients' lives. This could result from an economic downturn, an innovation, you changing up your work, or a new trend in your industry. Any of these shifts may require you to change your positioning and strategy to stay relevant.

I encourage you to think of this exercise less about “how do I take my competition down” and more about “what’s happening in the world right now and where is the opportunity?” Even with the ebb and flow of clients, I believe there’s a lot of business to go around in the independent world. Doing a competitive analysis for our world is different than how a SaaS company might approach it that has a direct competitor fighting for the same dollar.

The mindset I encourage you to take is rather to get a strong picture of the landscape and identify ways to:

• Differentiate against my competitors
• Find ways to partner with my competitors
• Change the language of what’s happening in your market

Now, it’s time to turn the mirror around and run the same analysis on yourself. This will help you adopt your competitor's perspective and identify your strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities. Put yourself in the shoes of the same competitor that you analyzed, and then look at your business:

• Where are you showing up?
• How would they describe you?
• What do you do well?
• What are you missing?
• How do you describe yourself?
• Pricing information (where discoverable)

Looking at your business from a high level, which competitors are you falling short of, and what keeps you from performing at a high level? What are some opportunities for you to bulk up your value proposition, and importantly, what are you going to let them be better than you at? As you consider this, you can think about areas to adjust your business.

• Your positioning
• Pricing strategy
• Brand perception
• Services you offer
• Marketing strategies
• Client base and relationships
• Operational efficiency and processes
• Strategic networking and partnerships
• Skill level and certification
• Online presence

Indirect competitors are people who may solve a similar problem to you or the same problem but in a different way. I also refer to this as replacement competition. This might be the hardest one to see. Think of Netflix and movie theaters, Uber and public transportation, or Amazon and a local bookstore.

I emphatically encourage you to see these people as opportunities to build partnerships. As an independent, you are more valuable to your clients if you have a roster of excellent referrals that you can introduce them to and you have collaborators so that you can help with a wider variety of projects. A rising tide raises all ships!

Select two indirect competitors and look for opportunities based on the following:

• What do they do that you don’t? Look at this first. What services do they offer that you don’t have any overlap with?
• What do you do that they don’t? Similarly, what do you do that they don’t outwardly offer? Between this and the other, you can see where you complement each other.
• How do your audiences differ? If there’s really no overlap in your audiences, could you be a referral partner to them?
• How are your audiences similar? What do your customers have in common, and how could you combine your expertise to make something very powerful?

From looking at your direct, indirect, and substitute competitors, you’ve drilled down into how you’re positioned against them. Now, zoom out again to consider larger market trends and changes.

Think of the larger trends affecting your industry, services, and clients. You can monitor these trends by simply keeping your information diet healthy.

• Talk to existing clients
• Monitor social media
• Subscribe to industry newsletters
• Participate in online communities
• Read Reddit and industry blogs
• Attend webinars and speaker series

Looking for large structural changes or anything that seems new, innovative, or disruptive.

• Technological advancements (e.g., AI, new platforms, etc.)
• Regulatory changes (e.g., legal changes, lawsuits, copyright risk, interest rates, etc.)
• Evolving customer needs and preferences

Finally, considering these conversations happening in your industry, which do you want to be a part of and which do you want to stay away from? If you’re a content strategist who just doesn’t want to talk about AI anymore, don’t. You don’t have to play into everything that’s going on if they don’t truly matter to you.

You can learn more about differentiation with , but to cover it briefly, differentiators are going to make you stand out and should move a customer to take action. The best differentiators:

• Are rooted in a specific part of your offering. That part might be your approach, specific data, methodologies, or skill sets that you have.
• Have clear benefits. The fact that you bring this to your work should produce a benefit to the client. It could be emotional (how you make them or their customers feel), functional (what you enable the client to do, either through your services or approach), strategic (unlocks something they couldn’t otherwise access), or something else.
• Seriously stand out. Especially in crowded markets, you’re looking for high differentiation, not just getting to parity with competitors.
• Are relevant to the client and the end user. The differentiator has to be important to the client and whoever is receiving the final product of your work. This is important for running a good sales process.
• Are real and legitimate. You need to be able to stand behind this differentiator—it can’t be contrived.

To get there, consider these reflective questions.

• What will your brand do that your competitors don’t? What impact does your brand make on someone that feels fresh compared to others? It could be a perspective, a specific service, or a way that you make the client feel.
• How does your personal experience in your field make you a better option? What do you want to bring in that other people may not have that will help you stand out? One unique thing about being independent is that you get to bring more of your personality into your brand.
• What do your clients remember you for? When a client is going to refer you to other people, what do you want them to say? For me, it’s that I stick with them through it all. Bring that into your brand.
• How do you go above and beyond to serve your clients? This could mean putting in the extra work, giving a uniquely empathetic approach, or not stopping until the client is happy with the work.
• What makes your approach worthwhile? What about the process you take makes you better, easier to work with, or more effective than a competitor?

For independent workers, one substitute could be marketplaces or software products. For example, if you’re an SEO consultant, your client might instead use SEMRush and try to figure it out themselves. Or, if you’re a coach, your client might go to BetterUp instead of working with you directly.

Another way to think about it is to consider who provides services similar to you, but at scale. If you do marketing work, you might see Red Antler or other large brands and marketing agencies as competitors, but only on a much larger scale.

Even if you’re not on Upwork, which many of us aren’t, it’s something that your potential clients might go to as they’re looking for help, and so you need to position yourself against that.

• Why does your client choose them? They’re looking for a new solution, and they don’t want to wait or search for a referral. They might also think it’s cheaper or more efficient to do it this way.
• What makes your service a better choice? What do you offer that these substitutes don’t, and how might that more effectively help your client get what they’re looking for?
• What are my opportunities to leverage this? How could you use this substitute to capture leads or educate them on why your services are better than the substitute?

Direct competition is the people who offer the same service to the same audience. In everyday terms, this could be Coke and Pepsi, Nike and Adidas, iPhone and Android. These products are pitted directly against each other.

I recommend doing a competitive analysis for at least three direct competitors so you can spot trends. When evaluating your direct competitors, you’re looking for where you’re aligning versus where you aren’t. This will help you spot opportunities to improve and differentiate – not to mimic. Use the questions below to guide your analysis:

• Where are they showing up? Are they on Instagram, LinkedIn, or certain platforms? Do they have a website or a substack?
• How would you describe them? Look at their services, know what they offer, and analyze that in terms that apply to you, and you could potentially differentiate.
• What do they do well? What do they seem very good at, and what do you need to be prepared to talk about with your potential clients if you’re competing for the same business?
• What are they missing? This is their weak areas and opportunities for you to position against them.
• How do they describe themselves? Find the language they use in their marketing, and understand why that’s compelling or not.
• Pricing information (where discoverable). This is helpful to understand the market where you’re priced and what your clients might be benchmarking against.