Competitive Displacement in Marketing: How to, Why, and When?

Author: Marshal Sequira

In today’s dynamic business environment, customer expectations are ever-changing, and the competition is intense. And like it or not, your ideal customer base already has access to a product or service that is similar to yours, a solution to their pain points.

This also means that you no longer need to sell them a solution. You need to persuade them that there is a better solution to their problems – You! You need to create a compelling reason to persuade the clients to change – enter the business of Competitive Displacement. But turning your competitor’s clients into your own is a game of skill, patience, and an effective strategy.

Think about this, 57% of the buying decision has already been made even before a salesperson connects with the customer. This shows that when you are trying to pursue a competitive customer, they have already made a number of decisions that do not lead them to you!

No doubt, you will have to work harder and adopt competitive displacement to effectively capture their attention and prove why you are better than your competitor. Not sure how? Worry not, we’ll walk you through the concept of competitive displacement and why is there a need for it.

What is Competitive Displacement?

Simply put, competitive displacement is the art of convincing your target clients to make a shift from their current solution to yours. This involves comprehensive competition research and analysis, from understanding your competition, and determining the products and services they offer, to analyzing their content for better insights.

Businesses use competitive displacement marketing tactics to move customer loyalty. This could include deploying a cold email campaign to your competitor’s clients, running relevant ads on social media, hosting events, etc.

Additional Read: Why Integration of ERP and CRM Systems into Sales and Marketing is Important?

The Why?

Competitive displacement businesses capitalize on the dissatisfaction of their competitor’s clients. Yours is a challenging market space where several companies are offering a product or service similar to yours. Here, making the most of your competitor’s missed opportunities and shortcomings can help you capture customers who are looking for a better experience.

But it does not end here. It is also crucial to remember that while you are working to displace your competition, they are also working proactively to displace you. So, now you need to target these customers at the right time.

The When?

If you’re a B2B marketer, you already know how important it is to maintain healthy and long-term client relationships. But chances are, your competitors are not able to live up to their customers’ expectations due to various reasons. As reports suggest, 75% of businesses and tech leaders fear competitive displacement, if they fail to keep up with technological innovation. And perhaps, this is your opportunity to swoop in and convince these customers to make the switch.

However, by encouraging the clients to make the switch, you are essentially asking them to-

• Abandon the existing vendor
• Work with an unfamiliar business
• Get acquainted with your business and people
• Go through the tedious process of setting up a new account with your business
• Go through a whole new set of different procedures

So, unless your targeted client is facing some issues with their existing vendor, persuading them to leave this business relationship might be frustrating. But does this mean that you cannot sell to this competitive customer? Not really!

The key here is to rethink your strategy and look for ways to complement the customer’s existing relationship without replacing it. By meeting their specific needs that your competition was unable to address.

Once you are sure the customer is ready to make the shift, you can capture their business with the following strategies.

The How to?

Even when a competitive user is happy with the resources they are using, all you need is one small opportunity to prove yourself, without affecting the existing business relationship.

1. Research

Start by understanding the needs of your competitive user and determine what you can offer them better. Get answers to these questions

• Who your competitor’s customers are?
• What do they want and need?
• What aren’t they getting from your competitor?
• How can you be a better solution?

Similarly, collect feedback from your own customers to understand why they picked you over the competition. This way, you can determine how and what can make you different and use these insights to pursue the competitive user. Most importantly, figure out if this difference is something that these potential customers really want. After all, you cannot solve a problem that doesn’t exist, right?

2. Engage

The next step is to engage them and let them know how your business will provide value to them. And the best way to go about it is by offering relevant content on social media. Use the insights gained in the research stage and create content that resonates with your potential customers.

Hook your customers with just enough information to convince them that you can indeed solve their problems better than their existing vendor. Then, depending upon your audience’s preferred communication channels, you can address their needs with blog posts, eBooks, videos, newsletters, and more.

3. Capture

So now your potential customers are hooked, it’s time to get ahead of your competitors and capture these clients by utilizing multiple sales channels. You can leverage email marketing to develop a personalized business relationship with the client and drive up to 6X higher revenue.

But your job doesn’t end here. Your competitor is as motivated as you to displace you and gain business. So, now you need to make sure to follow through on your promises to keep these customers happy.

Additional Read: 10 Top Tech Companies In The World: Redefining The Industry

Final Words

To survive in this competitive market, it is vital to pay attention to the idea of competitive displacement to acquire new clients and retain them for lasting business relationships. Learn as much as you can about your competition to position your business against its strengths and weaknesses. This way, you can address the needs of your competitive user and pose the best solution to the problems they can find.