Taking on the Market Leader:
Give Customers a Better Reason to Choose You

In the 1990s, I took responsibility for a weekly used-car magazine in Sweden. Think of a publication similar to the American AutoTrader: people bought it to find cars, and private sellers and dealers advertised their vehicles in it.

We were number two in the market. The leader had been around longer and sold considerably more magazines. Our title was losing money.

We were also, in effect, a me-too product. We offered something similar to an established competitor, to much the same audience. There was already demand for the category, but we needed a better reason for people to choose us.

As project manager with full profit-and-loss responsibility, it was my job to find that reason and make it commercially viable.

Start with the comparison customers make

I sat down with our magazine, the market leader’s publication, the other competing titles and the available circulation figures. I wanted to understand the gap between us and what we could realistically change.

One difference stood out: the market leader had more cars for sale.

For someone buying a used car, that mattered. More listings meant more choice and a better chance of finding a suitable vehicle. If we wanted more people to buy our magazine, improving that choice was a sensible place to start.

It also gave us a clear objective. “Become more competitive” could have meant almost anything. Increasing the number of cars advertised gave us something concrete to organise around.

That is where I think many me-too businesses need to begin. Being similar gets you into the category. It does not explain why a customer should choose you.

Build the operation behind the offer

To increase our private listings, I established an in-house telemarketing operation. We subscribed to morning newspapers across Sweden carrying classified advertisements, and the team contacted people advertising cars for sale to ask whether they wanted to advertise in our magazine.

I also employed six field salespeople who visited car dealers and sold advertising space. Dealer advertisements could include long lists of vehicles, which helped expand the selection available to readers.

We used promotional packages to increase listings further, including additional appearances for private advertisements. Some listings were free, although most private advertisements were paid.

These efforts worked together. Telephone sales brought in private sellers, field sales developed dealer business, and the advertising packages helped listings accumulate. Eventually, we had more cars advertised than the market leader.

This required people, organisation and investment. The commercial judgement was that a stronger selection of cars could make the magazine more attractive to readers, while a larger readership could strengthen its appeal to advertisers. We needed to improve both sides of that relationship.

Give sellers two extra days

There was another part of the offer we could improve: the advertising deadline.

Both magazines reached readers on the same day. But sellers had to submit advertisements to the market leader by Tuesday. With us, they could submit as late as Thursday.

That gave them two additional days to get their car into the next issue.

We achieved this by shortening lead times within our production operation and working with the printing company. In 1994, we were producing the entire magazine digitally and delivering files to the printer through ISDN.

The technology helped us change the workflow. The customer benefit was straightforward: a seller who missed our competitor’s Tuesday deadline still had time to advertise with us that week.

I like this part of the story because it shows how an operational improvement can become a competitive advantage. Customers did not need to understand our production system. They needed to know when they could submit their advertisement.

When examining a business, it is worth looking behind the visible offer. An internal delay, handover or deadline may be limiting what you can promise customers.

Coordinate the changes and make the advantage clear

I brought these efforts together around the magazine’s fifth anniversary. We temporarily reduced the cover price by five Swedish kronor and supported the occasion with increased listings and a clear positioning message.

Under the magazine’s name, we used the slogan “Flest bilar”: “Most cars.”

We repeated it throughout our advertising. Crucially, it was true.

The temporary price reduction encouraged people to try the magazine. The larger selection gave them a reason to value it. The slogan made that advantage easy to understand and remember.

People started repeating it back to us: our magazine was the one with the most cars.

That was an important sign. We had changed how customers described the publication. The positioning was becoming associated with the product itself.

A clear message is much easier to sustain when the business delivers what it promises.

More cars did not mean market leadership

We began selling considerably more magazines, gained market share and moved from losing money to being quite profitable.

We did not become the market leader in magazine sales. We had overtaken the competitor on the number of cars advertised, which helped us build a stronger business, but their circulation remained larger.

Soon afterwards, the competitor approached the owner and acquired the whole publishing company, which also had other magazine titles.

The useful lesson is in the decisions that preceded the acquisition: understanding the competitive gap, improving the offer and coordinating the work needed to deliver it.

A me-too product still needs its own edge

I have no objection to a me-too product. An established category can give you a useful starting point: customers already understand what the product does and why they might buy it.

But a similar product needs an edge. You might be faster, cheaper, better suited to a particular customer or easier to do business with. You need to identify a difference that matters enough to influence a decision, then organise the business to deliver it profitably.

In our case, the advantages were specific. Readers had more cars to choose from. Sellers had a later submission deadline. The anniversary promotion gave new buyers a reason to try us, and the branding gave them a simple reason to remember us.

The newspaper calls and ISDN connection belong to their time. The questions behind them remain useful.

What does your customer compare before buying? Where does the competitor have an advantage? Which part of the offer can you improve? What would need to change in sales, operations or delivery to make that improvement possible?

You may find that several modest changes reinforce each other. Our turnaround came from a coordinated effort across the business, focused on an advantage customers could recognise.

Before trying to take on a market leader, give yourself a clear answer to one question:

Why should someone choose you?

Then make sure the answer is something your business can deliver.