Dealing effectivety with the competition

By Dave Kahle

6 6tTrHIS would be a great business I if it weren't for the comPetition!"

Unfortunately, the existence of the competition impacts every industry, every business, and every sales Position. What the comPetition does or does not do can make a dramatic impact upon a company and a salesperson. That impact can range from squeezing you to the point where you go out of business on one extreme, to creating tremendous opportunities for growth and profits on the other.

The competition and their potential impact on your business is a fact of life. No matter how hard You wish, you are not going to be able to make the competition go away.

While we can't change the comPetition, we certainly are responsible for our attitudes and behaviors toward the competition. What we saY and how we act about the competition can have a daily bearing on our bottom lines. An appropriate attitude and set of practices for dealing with the competition should be an essential part of every salesperson' s rePertoire.

Here are some of the salient Parts of that mindset:

A.Respe"t the competition.

Speaking badly about the comPeti- tion, looking down on them, finding fault with them, and generally disparaging them are all behaviors that I see frequently among the companies with whom I work.

It is easy enough to understand why that is. In sales meetings we are constantly told how our Products stack up against the competition, what makes our service suPerior, whY our people are more experienced and more knowledgeable than theirs, etc.

In my position as a consultant and sales educator, I am uniquelY Positioned to test the truth of these posi-

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