We compete for attention, but we’re not competitors – how does that work?

If you and I both want to work with the same person, we must be competitors, right? Wrong.

So, when is your competition not your competition?

Have you ever turned up to a networking event, whether it’s online or (back in the old days!) face-to-face, and found yourself talking to somebody who does the same thing you do? Very often you think, ‘I’m wasting my time. I need to move on to someone else’ (unless they’re just a particularly nice person you want to have a chat with). But if you’re there for business, chances are you’re competing, right?

Now, let’s change that and re-frame it to working with your website…

If you’re aiming at a particular type of client, a great tip is to look at what other websites are doing who aren’t competing with you, but who also aim at that type of client.

I’ll give you an example:

We created a website for a large UK company, who run a number of care homes and nursing homes, offering very specialist care. The first thing we do at FAT Promotions with every project we handle, is we do a project compass. This is our blueprint – a unique document that we create for every project we work on and it gives a full 360 degree view of your business website, answering the following:

• Who’s looking at it?
• Who’s looking for you?
• Who’s not looking for you who could be?

Then we look at your competitors. This may sound like a weird thing to do because we’re not just going to copy what they do (all we know is we’re going to make your website look better than theirs!), but what we’re actually looking at is who is looking at those competitors – and are they finding what they want?

That’s especially useful if we’re looking at others in the same industry as you – but who else should you consider?

With the care homes and nursing homes, we worked with their in-house marketing team to identify that their target audience was not the senior people themselves who chose the home, but usually their sons and daughters, who tended to be in their forties, early fifties.

The key question to ask was:

What else are those people looking at?

What else were they looking at during the same time that they’re looking for possible care for their loved ones? And the answer was… estate agents! Their choice was actually between finding the best possible long-term care provisions OR moving to a larger house and have their mum/dad come and live with them. So we looked at estate agent sites, and the first thing that anybody looks for is ‘where do you want to go?’

We realised that was the key message to get across. When someone was looking at our clients for nursing and long-term care provision, it wasn’t about how pretty it looked or the care services they offered or how big they were. It was: where are you? Because they didn’t want to waste time reviewing a care home in Glasgow if they lived in Cornwall!

It all came down to location. That was all that mattered to that target client.

This is the key thing to consider when you are creating your website and thinking, ‘who is going to be using this?’ Try expanding that, and ask yourself:

• What else are they looking at?
• Who else is competing for their attention, but they’re not competing with you?

By asking these questions, you can gain a real insight into how to get a much better conversion rate for your website (and therefore return on your investment) than you would otherwise achieve.