7 Ways to sell more even if your product is the same as that of your competitor

You don't always need to have a better product to compete; and sell more.... 

1. Even if your product is the same as your competitor, you can still sell more by making your  product available to the customers where your competitors’ product is not available. Identify where your competitor’s product is not available – but where the customer would appreciate it – and you score over your competition. This is true particularly of convenience products like toothpastes and soaps because people must find them without walking too much. The same applies to impulse products like soft drinks, confectionery, eatables, affordable fashion. How would customers buy unless they see it prominently. My friend Jagdeep Kapoor says; “jo dikhta hai woh bikta hai”  
2. Even if your product is the same as your competitor, you can still sell more by delivering it to customers where, when and in quantities they require. For products which are heavy, cumbersome or risky to carry, this works. These days, where walking or traveling is becoming increasingly difficult, would offering to deliver helps? My friend Jayesh Ravindranath says; “we recommended to Dubai based retailer Choithram that a kiosk be put after the checkout counter so that anyone who does not want to lug the goods along with her can have them delivered later when she wants it by paying a small fee and leaving them at the kiosk”. Even in B2B selling, customers who are space constrained will appreciate more frequent deliveries in smaller lots. The customer will save a lot of space and will pay you for it by giving you a better price.
3. Even if your product is the same as your competitor, you can still sell more by providing financing to your customer through a various schemes like loans, hire purchase, EMI etc. This is true for big ticket items like cars and expensive consumer durables. My friend Sundar says, “An LCD TV at a price of Rs 60000 is a very different “product” than the same TV at a down payment of Rs 5000 per month and an EMI of Rs 3000 every month.” The market expands dramatically many fold when you provide finance - many more customers can now afford to purchase it.  
4. Even if your product is the same as your competitor, you can still sell more by if people are more aware of your product. This is particularly true of fancy, novel products and un-needed products like fashion, novelties, curios, small and big luxuries, insurance policies etc. Your customers tend to buy them when they become aware of them though ads, showrooms, window displays or sales pitches. My friend Vikesh Wallia once said; “a large display window of a department store on the high street of Pedder Road went for a song whereas an outdoor sign board of the same size near the store went at several times the price”. The difference was that the signboard went from the advertising budget of the Product Manager through an ad agency whereas the compensation for the window display went from the display budget of the area manager through the distributor.  In the insurance business I know many customers who rue buying a particular policy because they were not aware of what was the appropriate policy for them. There are literally millions of products out there on the shelves but the customers can keep hardly 3-4 alternatives in their mind for every product category they are likely to buy. This is called as "consideration set" of each customer. If you are not in the consideration set of a person, it is highly unlikely that she will buy your product. She does not know it exists!
5. Even if your product is the same as your competitor, you can still sell more by educating and  updatingThis is true for situations where the customer does not know that she has a problem, or that there is a solution or how to access and use the solution. Suresh Goklaney of Eureka Forbes says; the customers. “when we launched vacuum cleaners, people were not aware that the millions of dust mites hidden in carpets, upholstery and curtains lead to respiratory irritation of house members. Or, when launched AquaGuard water purifier, people were not aware that 80% of the diseases in a tropical country like ours were due to water borne disease-carrying bacteria. The biggest task was to make the customer aware that she had a problem using educational approach and demonstration. After that, the product sold itself in most cases.” I know of a printing press owner who was eternally grateful to a sales executive who educated him that,  instead of buying a new offset-printing machine costing several crores, he could purchase some balancing equipment and change his layout to increase his plant capacity at only 20% of the cost of a new machine. The printer never ever questioned the quotations or prices of that sales executive after the episode.     
6. Even if your product is the same as your competitor, you can still sell more by providing expertise to the customer and help him diagnose the problem and suggest a solution. This is true of situations where the customer does not really know how to define the problem and evaluate a solution. My friend Satish Menon builds houses and says, “a customer was so fed up of water leakage during monsoon in his flat that he was seriously thinking of selling it off. I spent half a day investigating it and found that the holes drilled to drive nails in the neighbor’s external wall were  responsible for the leakage. He was happy to pay me 3 times the price I was really expecting.” 
7. Even if your product is the same as your competitor, you can still sell more by helping the customer to install, fit and commission it. This is true of products which need to be connected, installed, fitted and commissioned at site. This is normally true in B2B businesses where plant and machinery is bought by the customer in bits and pieces from different vendors but needs someone to put it all together and make it work. Even in B2C situations, architects, interior decorators, engineers etc work in this fashion. Customer always pay good price to people with good reputations and good work to show off.