Where Will I Be While My Competitor Is Better Known?
Brand awareness competition gets described as a race: whoever appears most wins. That framing loses it for a small business from the start, because a budget race is a race already lost. 📈
Short answer: don’t enter the awareness race. Be first to mind in a narrow subject. Being first in a narrow area is both cheaper and more profitable than being fifth in a broad one.
Below: what awareness actually tells you, the power of a narrow position, which narrowing to choose, and a one-year plan. 🛡️
What does awareness tell you?
In brand awareness competition, what’s visible is usually not the whole truth.
What’s the power of a narrow position?
The small business’s real card sits here.
Can you broaden later?
Yes, and that’s the right order: first make a name in a narrow area, then broaden on top of that name. A business going the other way makes a name nowhere.
Which narrowing should you choose?
There are several ways to narrow.
Three axes of narrowing
1) Audience — a particular sector or business size. 2) Need — a single problem. 3) Geography — a defined area. Choosing one is enough; combining two sharpens the position further. 🧭
What shouldn’t you do against a competitor?
Some reflexes cause damage.
Two common mistakes
One: imitating the competitor’s sentence — between two businesses saying the same thing, the one who said it first is remembered. Two: trying to close the awareness gap with a discount; that confirms price as the only measure and eats the margin — details in the price question article. 🚫
What should the one-year plan be?
The way to turn worry into a plan is to split the year into quarters.
The quarter-by-quarter roadmap
Q1: conversations, the narrow position decision, promise and proof. Q2: the first three contact points and the message set settling. Q3: becoming visible in that narrow subject — content, references, sector venues. Q4: measurement and, if warranted, broadening one axis. By year’s end your competitor may still be better known; but you’ll be first to mind in one subject. All questions on the brand consulting page. 🗺️
📝 Field Notes
To a client complaining about a better-known competitor we asked: what sentence would someone recommending you use? There was no answer. The competitor’s sentence was clear — narrow and specific. The awareness gap came not from budget but from describability. With the same budget a narrow position was chosen, and referrals started. 🎯
📖 Quick Glossary
Position: for whom, in which need, instead of whom you’re chosen. Category: the shelf in a customer’s mind. Referability: being passable to someone else in one sentence. Awareness: being remembered when seen.
⚡ Quick Summary
Don’t enter the awareness race; be first to mind in a narrow subject. 📈 Being known doesn’t mean being preferred. Narrow on one of three axes: audience, need, geography. Imitating a competitor’s sentence and closing gaps with discounts are two classic mistakes.
🎯 Next Step
Let’s pull the narrow position you could be first in out of your sales data: the quote page. Scope on the consulting page. 🗺️
Frequently Asked Questions
Sık Sorulan Sorular
It doesn’t. Being known is being remembered; being preferred is carrying a reason. There are businesses everyone knows and nobody knows why they’d choose — and those take the worst of the price pressure. 🧠
Usually budget. Visibility bought with advertising shrinks when the advertising stops; visibility arriving through referral accumulates. Knowing which one you’re looking at matters. 👀
Because mental space opens by category. In the “web design” category you’re tenth; in “websites for dental clinics” you can be first. A customer looks for a shelf in their mind, and being the only name on that shelf beats being anonymous on a broad one. 🎯
Apparently yes, practically no. A narrow position raises referability: people can say “I know someone who does exactly that”. On a broad position that sentence can’t be formed — the mechanism sits in the do-I-have-a-brand article. 🗣️
Look at the work that repeats in your customer conversations: which type of customer finds you more easily, which jobs close with fewer objections. Position comes from sales data, not imagination — the method sits in the starting article. 📊
Short term the type of enquiry changes; long term qualified enquiries rise. A narrow position makes referral easier and reduces price objections. You don’t have to drop existing customers either; what changes is how you’re described.
They might, but whoever said it first has the advantage and a position isn’t only a sentence — it needs proof. References, content and accumulated experience can’t be imitated. That’s why you pick the position and start producing proof immediately.
Yes, once the promise is clear; advertising is a multiplier. Advertising with an unclear sentence spreads the vagueness. Order: narrow position and promise first, budget second.
Source: OECD — SMEs