Competing with an expert who dominates marketing

[bernard]

I posted this in the Orientation section, because I think it is a rather common occurence.

I want to go into a market, a food&beverage niche, to be exact.

Obviously this is a highly passionate field of geeks and foodies galore. In my exploratory research I stumble upon someone who is a total expert, journalist, certification, popular social media, maybe even a small time celeb. Normally that wouldn't bother me, but this guy runs affiliate offers on his excellent, nicely designed, perfectly written niche site.

Now what.

What do you when you feel like someone has this niche on lock to a level you can never reach?

1. Do you expand your niche to be broader?
2. Do you don't care and remind yourself about your skills in SEO?
3. Do you use this guy as quotes and social proof on your own site (incl. links and citations)?

All of the above?

and...

Remind yourself that all that time spent actually making food, taking pictures and travelling, can't be spent working on conversions, links, promotion, design?

 

[secretagentdad]

Rank for his brand tail by complimenting him a lot. Then, have a nice CTA in your header that pulls people to your other content.

The downside to noise making as a biz model is someone can always decide to come surf off your brand equity.

Do some digital Judo.

 

[Ryuzaki]

Are you talking about building a product here or an affiliate site or what?

There's always room for another competitor. You won't beat him right out of the gates but you can over time. And even if you can't, that doesn't mean you can't get exposure and make money.

You can also collaborate with the guy. Do something simple like co-sponsor an infographic or something. Then you can write a post for him and link back to yourself, then write another version of the post for your site and link to him. You can find more and more ways to leech off of his exposure, with videos, podcasts, whatever. You have to make it so beneficial to him that it'd be stupid to say no and not promote it to his fans, which puts you in front of the fans.

Another option would be to not go into it as an affiliate site but to go into it with a product and get him as your top affiliate.

There's also all the SEO stuff you can do like snipe his keywords. Even if you come up #2 below him you'll start to get recognition (and traffic).

I've never entered a niche where there wasn't already dozens of masterfully done websites ranking and banking with great social presence and all that. It's never stopped me from eroding their marketshare and earning enough to have warranted the whole operation. They can't be every where at all times and even if they are, the people are hungry for content!

 

[bernard]

I've never entered a niche where there wasn't already dozens of masterfully done websites ranking and banking with great social presence and all that.

Ok, it's quite rare here. It's usually either affiliate sites or personal blogs, which are not optimized for affiliate income. So when you have someone who is killing it, blog (in multiple languages), big brand, insta, facebook, real guest posts, vids, courses everything, then it does seem like a big challenge.

Usually I see "our" position in the market as bridging the gap from nerds to consumer, but this guy actually has an easy to read, big font, short paragraph website.

Even so, it's probably worth remembering that people don't all want the full on, passionate experience and that there are other considerations at play.

It's never stopped me from eroding their marketshare and earning enough to have warranted the whole operation. They can't be every where at all times and even if they are, the people are hungry for content!

I agree and one thing I am thinking about, is thinking about this like, get in on the beginner journey, use those expert content and comment on how it worked for you! There's also the corporate angle. Buying something for the office or business isn't the same as the private. There's the brand status stuff.