In this article · 7 parts
Other businesses offering something similar are a reason to investigate the market, not an automatic reason to abandon your idea. The question is whether a specific group of customers has a reason to choose an offer you can deliver economically. Equally, finding no obvious competitor does not prove that you have found an opportunity.
For someone testing a small business in the time they have, the useful comparison is local and practical: what does the customer do now, what does that arrangement cost them, and what would make changing worthwhile?
You do not need to be unique in every respect. You do need a credible answer to “Why would this person choose this offer on this occasion?”
1Begin with the customer's alternatives
Imagine the problem exists but your business does not. What happens next?
A customer might use a specialist, buy a replacement, ask a friend, do the work themselves, travel farther, wait or leave the problem unresolved. All belong in the comparison because each competes for the same decision.
The Irish Local Enterprise Office's market research guidance includes investigating customer needs, competing offers and prices. Extend your working comparison to the alternatives buyers describe, including options that are not businesses.
This changes what you look for. A repair offer may be competing less with another repairer than with the convenience of buying a replacement. A home-organising service may be competing with postponing the work, rather than another organiser. Better branding will not necessarily change either decision.
Choose one buying occasion. “Anyone who needs repairs” is too broad. “Local commuters with a routine repair they need completed before next week's journey” gives you a much clearer set of timing and access questions.
2Build a small comparison from observable facts
Start with a few relevant alternatives, not a census of every provider. Record the source and date of each observation because prices, availability and service areas can change.
Look for the total price or basis of pricing, what is included, the geographical area, booking arrangements, lead times where published, and what the buyer must do. Note whether information is confirmed, advertised or unknown.
Do not treat a missing price on a website as evidence of poor service. Some jobs need assessment. Do not infer that a provider is fully booked because a calendar is unavailable. Do not submit fake customer enquiries to obtain confidential information or occupy appointment slots.
Public reviews can suggest questions to investigate, but they are not a representative sample of all customers. Record the issue as a possible concern rather than a market-wide fact. A complaint about collection timing, for example, gives you a question to ask potential buyers; it does not prove a profitable unmet need.
You can complete the first pass in several short sessions. Stop browsing once you can describe the main alternatives and the important unknowns. More screenshots will not resolve a question that needs a customer conversation.
3Illustrative example: the convenient service that might cost too much to deliver
Emma is made up, to show the idea
Emma works shifts and is exploring a clothing-alteration collection service for a small area. She can do the agreed basic alterations competently and is investigating the handling, storage and cover needed before taking work.
Her initial comparison looks like this:
| Alternative | What the buyer gains | Possible difficulty to investigate |
|---|---|---|
| Established town-centre alteration service | A known provider and wider range of work | Getting there during opening hours |
| Do it at home | No service fee | Time, equipment and confidence |
| Ask a relative | Familiarity and perhaps no charge | Uncertain timing or reluctance to ask |
| Buy another garment | A different item quickly | Replacement cost and waste |
| Emma's proposed limited collection round | A convenient handover window | Higher price, narrower scope and trust in a new provider |
Alternative: Established town-centre alteration service
- What the buyer gains
- A known provider and wider range of work
- Possible difficulty to investigate
- Getting there during opening hours
Alternative: Do it at home
- What the buyer gains
- No service fee
- Possible difficulty to investigate
- Time, equipment and confidence
Alternative: Ask a relative
- What the buyer gains
- Familiarity and perhaps no charge
- Possible difficulty to investigate
- Uncertain timing or reluctance to ask
Alternative: Buy another garment
- What the buyer gains
- A different item quickly
- Possible difficulty to investigate
- Replacement cost and waste
Alternative: Emma's proposed limited collection round
- What the buyer gains
- A convenient handover window
- Possible difficulty to investigate
- Higher price, narrower scope and trust in a new provider
The possible advantage is access, not a claim that established providers are bad. Emma needs to learn whether handover inconvenience is serious enough for people to pay for collection, and whether enough suitable orders can be grouped into a manageable round.
If every customer requires a separate journey, the convenience may be valuable to them but uneconomic for her. If customers are happy to wait until a scheduled round, the model may deserve a small test. Neither conclusion can be reached by looking at competitors' homepages alone.
4Write a reason to switch that you can honour
Complete this sentence: “For people who need ___ and currently use ___, this offer may be preferable because ___.”
The final blank must describe something the buyer can experience. An agreed collection window, a clearly bounded job, an accessible location or a specialised competence is more testable than “better quality” or “excellent service”. If you claim higher quality, identify the standard and how you will demonstrate it.
Then ask what the advantage costs you. Convenient collection requires transport and coordination. Fast turnaround needs capacity held available. A lower price reduces what remains to pay for your work. A wider service area may add travel faster than it adds useful bookings.
An advantage that only works because you ignore your own time is not yet a viable advantage. Write down the trade-off explicitly. You may decide to provide a benefit on certain days, within a defined radius or for a narrower type of work.
Avoid making negative claims about named competitors. You can describe your own offer accurately without asserting that another business is unreliable, expensive or careless. A proposed positioning statement is a hypothesis about customer choice, not evidence that you outperform anyone.
5Ask about a real decision
Speak with people who recently faced the buying occasion. Ask what they chose, which alternatives they considered, what mattered and what made the choice inconvenient. Ask what they paid only where they are comfortable sharing it, and distinguish remembered estimates from receipts or firm quotes.
If they did nothing, explore why. Perhaps the problem was not urgent. Perhaps the cost was unaffordable. Perhaps doing nothing was entirely reasonable. Unresolved demand is not necessarily payable demand.
Only after understanding the current arrangement should you describe your proposed alternative. Ask what would prevent them using it and what would need to be clear before booking. A positive reaction can help you refine the offer, but a real purchasing decision remains a separate test.
Record contradictions. If one person wants urgent turnaround and another wants the lowest possible price, do not assume you must satisfy both. They may represent different buyers or occasions. Choose the group whose needs fit the business you can actually operate.
6Decide whether the gap is accessible to you
A possible gap deserves a test when four things appear plausible: a recognisable buyer, a meaningful reason to choose the offer, a way to reach that buyer, and delivery conditions you can sustain.
If the buyer exists but is difficult to reach without unaffordable advertising, access is the next problem. If the benefit depends on daytime availability you do not have, fit is the problem. If the price customers accept cannot support delivery, economics is the problem.
Finding an established competitor does not answer any of those questions. Nor does finding a large industry statistic. A national market can be substantial while the number of suitable buyers within your available radius and hours remains too small.
If there are no visible providers, investigate adjacent alternatives and purchasing behaviour before celebrating. There may be hidden providers, a difficult regulatory requirement, low willingness to pay or a service people already obtain informally. Absence is an observation, not an explanation.
7Your next useful note
Create a comparison with three alternatives and one row for your proposed offer. Mark every unknown rather than filling it with an optimistic guess. Under the table, write the strongest reason a buyer might switch and the strongest reason they might stay with the current arrangement.
Use your next available session to investigate whichever unknown could most easily rule the offer out. The smaller version is one question: “What did you do the last time you needed this, and why that option?”
The result may be a narrower offer, a different customer group or a decision that there is no worthwhile opening for you at present. That is the purpose of the comparison: to find a reason grounded in the customer's decision, before you spend money trying to look different.
General information to help you think things through. Not regulated financial, legal or tax advice.