How to completely take over a niche and obliterate your competition, and how I finally dumped my local taxi firm

 Arnold Schwarzenegger is alleged to have said that he doesn’t do sequels when it comes to films, but that he made an exception for Terminator.

Well, this post is a sequel to How to completely take over a niche and how my local taxi firm is driving me mad.

What’s more, it’s a fantastic sequel because it proves the point I made in the original post perfectly.

To recap, my local taxi firm is a joke. They run a 24-hour ’service’ in a one horse town and can’t manage to get at taxi to my door at 5:30 AM.

The problem is not overbooking, nor is it traffic on the road.

The problem my local taxi firm has is one of management: they have a poor system in place, and are too lazy to fix it.

Maybe part of their laziness is due to complacency, because no other local taxi firm offers a 24-hour service, which makes them the only fish in a small pond.

They have a monopoly, and they are failing to deliver an excellent service. In fact, they deliver an appalling service, one that I’ve had the misfortune to test over and over again for a period of three months.

The point I made in the original post is that this situation presents a fantastic opportunity for somebody to set up shop and completely take over the niche very quickly simply by providing excellent service, good enough to steal every disgruntled customer from the competition.

And that, I’m pleased to say, is exactly what has happened.

But more importantly, this provides a fantastic business lesson that can be applied to every small business.

Let’s get to it!

How the newcomer caught my attention

It started with a leaflet, the kind that your local pizza parlour likes to out through your letterbox.

Who said direct marketing was dead?

I saw the leaflet, advertising exactly what I needed at exactly the right time.

Another local taxi service has now decided to offer a 24-hour service.

They took the time to educate me with a good leaflet, telling me how easy their new system was going to make my life.

And it has.

My new schedule goes like this…

• When I need a taxi to get me to the station at stupid o’clock, which is around twice a week, I book a taxi.
• When I ring, the person at the other end knows who I am, because my number is now in their computer system. They know my name, my address, and they can see the history of my journeys.
• I say: ” I need a taxi for 5:30 AM”
• They say: “Certainly Mr Gonzalez… Will that be picking you up at [...]?”
• “Yes please”
• “and drop you off at [....]?
• “Yes please”

And then, around 10 minutes before my pickup I get a text from their computer system, telling me that my taxi is on its way, and telling the also the colour and model of the car.

At the same time I received a text, my driver ‘to be’ receives the job in the form of a text sent to a smart phone with GPS tracking.

The beauty of automation.

The driver gets the job and directions to my location show up on his screen.

And here’s the bit I really like…

When the driver is a few minutes aways from me, he presses a button and I get a second text letting me know that my taxi is here.

I’ve had the pleasure of taking five journeys with these people, and each time they have been bang on the dot.

How to wipe out your competitor

Two days ago I was travelling again.

Upon hearing the greeting I realised that I had dialled my old taxi firm.

A smile appeared on my face and it was a joy to say to them: “sorry… wrong company“.

What is important to realise here is that there is nothing that this company can now do to earn back my custom, other than selling up to a different management and sacking just about everybody I spoke to each time I rang and demanded to know where my taxi was.

 If somebody you hate shows up at your door with exactly what you want at half the price you can find it for, you will rather pay extra and get it from somebody else than to grab a bargain at the cost of giving the sale to the person you hate.

So, I repeat, there is nothing that this company can now do to earn back my custom.

They have lost me.

And the point here of course is that they will loose every single customer that tries the competitor’s new computerised service.

If you think that you have to spend a fortune to replicate this kind of success, then you’re looking through the wrong end of the funnel.

It’s not the computer system itself that’s winning the customers over… but rather the excellent service that is being provided as a result of having and the computer system. The fact that they ‘remember’ your name; that they make booking is so easy and quick and convenient; the fact that the pick you up when you asked them to pick you up.

But there’s something else to all this. If you work hard, it’s still possible to build a loyal customer base without snazzy tools, as long as you’re able to deliver excellently.

The biggest fact in losing business here (and this is the big one) is that the first taxi company completely abused the monopoly they had on the 24-hour service by not caring enough about the customers and by delivering a shoddy service.

This is of key importance.

If the first taxi company turned up on time and worked efficiently, loyal customers wouldn’t care that a competitor had a new snazzy computer system, because the current system worked fine!

They would proably never try the new company if they didn’t need to.

So it’s not the computer system itself, but rather the service that is being delivered. The computer system is there to support the delivery of that service.

Reverse engineering the newcomer’s strategy

The newcomers’s strategy is in 2 simple parts.

1. Get the right system in place (systems)
2. Tell everybody about it (marketing)

I’m willing to bet the leaflet drop payed off very well for the new taxi firm.

As for the system, this is nothing new, if you live in a city. In fact, that kind of system is pretty standard these days in city cabs.

But I live in a one horse town, and a system like that, here, sets you apart from the competition.

This new taxi firm invested heavily in this system. In fact, I asked one of the taxi drivers about it and learned that they’d bought a second-hand system (because it’s so expensive).

But it works perfectly, and it’s a brilliant strategy for any business owner to mimic, the strategy being ‘getting the right tools for the job’.

Business takeaways

They say that you only as good as the tools you use, and this example proves this in many ways.

Sometimes there are costs, but you have to clearly define what it is that you’re trying to do, and how well you’re going to be able to do it with the right system or the right tools.

Remember: if it’s going to help your business, it’s an investment, not an expense.

Get the right system, then use it properly and integrate it into your business so that you can deliver an excellent service.

Do this and you’ll crunch your competition.

It’s just a matter of time.

A great system pays for itself in the end

Traveling to the station with the new taxi firm costs a little more than the old one. A few quid more in fact. But guess what: my early morning journies to the station are now stress-free, and that is priceless.

When you deliver excellent results you can charge higher than anybody else who doesn’t.

And people will pay it, because most people don’t want cheap (even if they think they do); they want results fast, and convenience.