Collaborating with other businesses is a great way to build momentum, broaden your audience, and grow your market share. Not only does collaboration produce innovation, it amplifies success by increasing resources through joint ventures of time and brainpower.
Here are three keys to collaborating with other businesses to experience massive growth.
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Collaborate with Indirect Competitors
Oftentimes what scares most businesses from collaboration is direct competition. In today’s market, consumers are faced with far more competing interests forcing stiffer competition amongst businesses. Indirect competitors, however, can help companies attain more of the market share. Consider all of those in demand companies whose organizations provide great avenues to consumers within your industry. For example, event rentals can partner with planners, corporations, and even childcare centers and schools. Indirect competitors are a great way to establish your presence, create active relationships, and generate profit.
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Collaborate with Customers
When we consider collaboration, customers are typically left out. Customer collaboration, however, is one of the most effective marketing tools to help establish your brand, increase company awareness, and offer greater customer experiences. Simple collaborative customer efforts can include product innovation with customer input, or personalized services/products. When customers have a buy-in to what a company creates they take a greater sense of pride and admiration in their purchases.
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Collaboration with Direct Competition
Strategic alliances done well can be a big win for any company. Not only do they broaden your audience but they can also make you powerful in the face of other competitors. You know the old adage two are better than one, well that is exactly what happens when you align your company in a healthy well-structured joint venture with a competitor. Furthermore, new alliances allow for advances in technology and skill sets that may not be available within the current company structure. In addition, collaborative efforts of this magnitude can be great for vendor sourcing, increasing capital and investment, as well as cross-promotions and infrastructure.
As you can see, collaboration can be an effective business strategy when used as a tool to grow and create demand in your business. While your competition won’t be completely eliminated, you will, however, increase your visibility and demand that will lead to an increase in your bottom line sales and revenue.
This is article was written by Tiffany Fulcher.
Tiffany Fulcher is the CEO and founder of Momspace, an online membership community for entrepreneurial moms who want to become moguls.Â
Learn more about Tiffany via her website at TiffanyFulcher.co and follow her on Twitter @tiffulcher.