How to avoid being eaten as a small fish in the sea of big sharks

By Lukas Szczurowski

If there is one thing that companies across all industries can agree upon, it’s that when entering the sea of big sharks, finding your competitive edge makes you feel as small as a guppy. Though your company may have innovative ideas and expert staff, getting noticed by your target audience is one of the many challenges that will stand in your way of success. Those companies that have chosen to take the route of playing catch up with their biggest competitors get swallowed in an instant, because no matter how hard they try, being able to stay ahead of those that continue to succeed, is a task that only a limited few can complete victoriously.

As a smaller company in the gigantic CRM industry, being able to achieve a unique competitive edge has been my primary concern. Though it has taken several years and a large budget, figuring out the steps that I need to take in order to make a mark in this industry has finally come to fruition. The first step being: create the ultimate customer experience.

At Luxor CRM, our first priority is our client. We have chosen to not be a vertical-specific CRM vendor in hopes of being able to serve any and every industry that comes our way. This fact along with our hand-holding approach has ensured that our client base is not only solid but satisfied to the utmost degree. We firstly provide a product, but surrounding that product is a wrap of services. In order to provide exceptional customer service, we believe in working with clients whose needs best match our capabilities.

Over the years, we have come to recognize that our sweet-spot is with deals of approximately 20-200 users. Though the range is large, our level of commitment and service has been the exact same for every client that falls in between. With that being said, we still believe that we provide optimal service for clients that are bigger than 200 and less than 20. The point to be made here is simply that our competitive edge strives off of being able to recognize our strengths and target those clients that we know we can provide the best quality experience for.

As of now, this strategy has proved successful and our clients can contest to the fact that we are continually working on enhancing the customer experience. The question I would like to raise in this blog is why haven’t other companies followed suit? If the first step in developing a competitive edge is providing great service, than why don’t companies target their ideal customer instead of reeling in anything that bites? Is this strategy a full-proof client retention tool or is it a temporary solution that will fall to the wayside once companies expand?

From the client perspective, do they shop for products and services with a similar approach, or are they automatically drawn to the big shark, simply because they have been repeatedly exposed to them through extensive marketing and advertising campaigns? If clients spent more time researching their options before making final decisions, they would select the company that best matches their needs and that will provide the best possible customer service.

I want to know your thoughts…

About the Author
Lukas Szczurowski is the CEO of Luxor CRM, a web-based CRM vendor, headquartered in Toronto, Canada.

Tags: Customer Relationship Management, online crm, saas crm, web-based crm, Luxor CRM, Leads, toronto crm