Don’t just look for weaknesses to exploit in your competition; also study strengths that you can learn from, the Inc.com article “6 Things to Know About What Your Competitors Are Doing Right,” explains. By identifying their strong points, you can learn how to beat them at their own game. Here are some question you should ask, and answer, about the competition:

1. Can you learn from their competitive advantage? Even if you know you’re superior to the competition, there’s probably something that they do better than you, or else they wouldn’t be in business at all. Are they faster? Cheaper? You don’t really want to become more like your competition necessarily, but you can adapt aspects that will minimize any advantages they have over you.
2. How are they marketing? Who is their target customer? What media do they use? What are they doing that you haven’t thought of and might work for you.
3. What are their sourcing and costs of goods sold? Are their products and equipment cheaper, or better? Are they better financed? If nothing else, you may be able to use their advantage as a bargaining chip with your current vendors.
4. What about their people? Are their employees better than yours? If so, is it because of superior training and management, or is it because they acquire better talent due to better pay and/or benefits? If you can identify reasons why people want to work for the competition, you may be able to use them to find better personnel for yourself.
5. How is their image compared to yours? What’s the first thing that comes to find when someone thinks about their business? And yours? Is it better, worse, or just different? Even if your focus is different, try to ensure that your one thing is better than one thing.
6. What about customer retention? Do their customers tend to be very loyal? If so, what are they doing to encourage such faithfulness? It may be something you need to try!

Click here to read the article from Inc.com.