If you don’t know what your competitors are doing on social media, how can you best craft a marketing plan that will bring customers your way?

There are three types of competitors to know and they are all important to the success of your marketing plan.

The most obvious, a direct competitor is any company offering the same products or services as your business. Think McDonald’s vs. Burger King. These competitors are usually easy to find, and you may already know some off the top of your head.

An indirect competitor is a business whose products or services are different from yours, but they are coming for the same customer. Think McDonald’s vs. Weight Watchers. Their outcome is different, but their target market is the same. These competitors may be a little tougher to find, but they’re worth it!

Finally, a secondary competitor is doing the same job, but in a different way. Think McDonald’s vs. Chipotle. These types of competitors are good to watch because your marketing focus may change if theirs is targeting yours in a negative way.

Look at their website, read their blog posts, and browse through their social media pages. What does their About section look like? What types of posts are they putting up? How much engagement are they getting? Analyze everything. If their metrics are good, you may want to do something similar. If their metrics are not good, don’t do something similar or you risk falling into their hole.

Google your competitors. What do their reviews look like? What does their presence in Google search tell you? You can find out a lot by Googling a company. (Don’t forget to Google yourself, also!)

Now, start social listening based on what you find with your competitors and what you already know. Who is your audience and what do they want? This will help you craft a highly-targeted and powerful social media strategy that will help you compete in a big way. We love this article from Sprout Social to learn more about social listening: Social listening – Your launchpad to success on social media

These three steps to success will help you find your competitors, analyze their presence online, and craft a killer marketing strategy to compete. We can’t wait to see what you come up with!