Effective Strategies to Overcome the Competition in the Ride-Hailing Business
After some lockdown and pandemic outbreak periods, the global ride-hailing sector is expanding. But on the other hand, the mobility sector is working hard to suffer losses and carve out a place for itself in the market.
Lack of marketing and planning is a common cause of failure for businesses in taxi app development. A crowded market won’t accept another identical product or service, and direct competition with the market’s leading providers of ride-hailing services needs substantial financial resources.
Can you outperform rivals and manage a long-lasting ride-hailing business?
Numerous established players in the ride-hailing industry include Uber, Lyft, Careem, Grab, Ola, and Go Jek.
Have newcomers still got a chance? They do. Do some study and decide on a clear direction before you start.
If you are a mobility startup, you may need to step up your efforts to develop powerful and effective tactics to outperform the competition and become the next unicorn in the market.
Let’s first explore how to run your firm in various scenarios before moving on to the tactics.
1. When the market for ride-hailing services is overly competitive
It would signify a developed market with numerous clients using comparable services, intense competition, and one dominant company holding between 40 and 75 percent of the market share.
It indicates that one to three market leaders are competing for a market share, have established high standards for customer service, and have attracted affluent customers who expect top-notch services from taxi companies. So rather than wait 15 minutes, they would choose to cancel a ride.
Do you believe there is a market for your new ride-hailing company if this is the case?
Let us assure you that every time you dig deep and conduct a study, there is always a hidden potential that needs to be investigated (if you want to get your piece of the cake). There are always those market sectors and geographical areas that these major firms underserve. You must locate them and make an effort to target them.
We’ll provide you with two tips that can enable you to overcome the stiff competition and establish a successful Uber clone ride-hailing company.
• Pay particular attention to market sectors with little competition from larger businesses.
• By concentrating on particular areas or cities and lowering your advertising and incentive expenditures might lessen competition from bigger companies.
Find a market or region where the competition for taxi services is not as fierce, and you can quickly overtake the competition. Draw in fewer clients searching for something the large players don’t provide. These clients will advocate for you as they tell their friends about their experiences.
Do you need any examples to help you realize this?
Hop Skip Drive has launched “Uber for kids” in Los Angeles. Customers in a crowded city needed reliable transportation for their kids every day to and from school. Hop Skip Drive spotted this opportunity and launched a service that let clients book rides in advance with drivers who had been thoroughly vetted and had met the parents.
Are you interested in the outcomes? Hop Skip Drive currently holds a sizable market share, has made investments totaling $10 million, and intends to grow by adding services for various social groups. Children are safe, which pleases their parents.
Let’s examine Ola, the country of India’s leading ride-hailing business. They were unbeatable despite Uber’s creative plan. The primary driver of this success is that Ola provides a unique service that is still very popular in India: three-wheelers (autorickshaws).
2. When the ride-hailing services market is unstable
We are talking about an unstable market if no companies have at least a 26% market share. Although users of ride-hailing applications are accustomed to them and have certain expectations, there may be a wide range of ride-hailing businesses rather than a single, dominant one.
Your distinctive offering will be noticed right away by the clientele. Starting a Uber clone app business is favorable compared to the highly competitive ride-hailing service market. Your success will depend on whether or not your differentiation relates to the customer’s needs.
We’ll use one as an illustration. A global ride-hailing business with operations in 45 nations is InDriver. This software has incredible functionality and gives its users the greatest prices. In contrast to Ola, Uber offers the option of negotiating the fare. InDriver allows consumers to specify the amount they are ready to pay based on an average price less than the rate supplied by other firms, unlike big brands with fixed pricing for every trip. The passengers can counter the price that the driver has given. Other options include designating whether a child seat is required, adding more destinations, etc.
3. Strategies to overcome the tough competition
Understand your rivals
It’s crucial to learn all there is to know about the competitors before engaging in competition. Then, you may map out the competition in a few different ways and then develop strategies. Some examples of typical behaviors are:
Conduct intensive market research
Make sure you have all the in-depth knowledge about your competition and other market participants before entering the market. It will ensure that you are switching to the appropriate tactics and can fill in the gaps. In addition, it is a vital duty to enable the processes to produce possible results and achieve the intended results.
- Map the functional capability of your competitors
You may also include the possible action of mapping the functional capabilities of your rivals on the list. But, again, it involves a comprehensive understanding of your competitors’ procedures, tech maturity, and other SOPs.
It will also be useful in identifying the technological strengths and weaknesses of the rivals’ workflows. Then, when you feel comfortable using the competitor’s tech stack, you can adjust your process planning.
- Perform the SWOT Analysis
This common method typically aids startups and rising companies learn more about the market’s strengths, opportunities, limitations, and dangers. First, it would help if you started with a solid grasp to establish your presence in the industry. Then, it will assist in building a solid base for your procedures.
- Keep an eye over their funding & Future Plan
The next step is to monitor the business’s funding and long-term strategy. It will ensure that you are informed about your competitor’s growth, scalability, and finance. Additionally, it aids in giving you a general notion of how to proceed with your fundraising campaign.
You can decide your next actions for expansion once you have comprehensive and current knowledge about the rivals. You can separate the vision goals into short-term and long-term objectives. And keep track of them by being aware of the milestones and meeting them all at once.
- Keep your tech strong
In the ride-hailing industry, your company must control the technical side of business operations. Therefore, a few crucial components of any ride system that you should consider are the online booking system, online ride requests, and payment collecting.
The following are some desirable features for your ride-hailing taxi app development:
1. Booking app: This tool allows drivers and passengers to connect and request rides. Customers can search for nearby transportation choices and submit requests based on their needs. Similarly, every request is communicated to the drivers via the app. They can accept or reject the request depending on their preferences and suitability.
2. Navigation: The essential to running your business with proper navigation is where the vehicles must pick up and drop off the passengers. The navigational maps assist in selecting the best route map and provide clients with a real-time estimated time of arrival (ETA), so they can estimate how long it will take their driver to arrive.
3. Communication: This highly effective function aids in guaranteeing smooth communication between the customer-admin, driver-customer, and driver. This two-way communication allows information to be shared and moved from one side to the other as needed. If the plan changes, it also assists drivers with correct real-time instructions from clients.
4. Payment Gateway: With this facility’s use, drivers and passengers may easily make payments through the gateway. The payment gateway allows it to start the process and collect payments immediately. In addition, you may seamlessly incorporate numerous payment channels into the current apps to add more variety.
5. Feedback/Reviews: Once more, having a specific area for collecting reviews enables users to provide input and score their whole experience. Ensure that reviews are well-formulated and can be used to a large extent. It can be quite beneficial to the stakeholders.
You must win the trust and confidence of your stakeholders if you want to choose techniques that will help you stay one step ahead of the competition.
Making your stakeholders pleased will allow you to plan properly for success.
These two key contributing stakeholders may determine the fate of your company. Let’s assess them:
Drivers:
- Offer them work balance: You must offer their drivers the ideal work-life balance if you want them to continue doing business with you. By doing this, you may lower the attrition rate of your drivers and ensure that they are content with their daily activities and want to continue working for you in the long run.
- Motivate them: Setting up performance-based incentives for your stakeholders is another effective strategy to keep them engaged with your company. It is a clever strategy to ensure you recognize and reward top performers while inspiring others to perform better.
- Account for sick leaves/ holidays: Allowing sick days when necessary and compensating them with the next available driver can demonstrate compassion for your drivers.
- Technology that saves them time and effort: Keeping your business procedures updated with the technology is important. With the help of outstanding tech support, you can resolve anything. It may aid in task distribution, and process automation can help the drivers and administrative staff save time and effort.
Customers:
- Run discounts regularly: Customers must continue to use your services. You can get customers’ attention by providing promo coupons and ongoing discounts.
The ability to include feedback: Once more, if you start giving your consumers the freedom to voice their feedback and ideas about a particular ride, you will empower your customers. It will assist in ensuring that you are amusing the clients and precisely addressing their worries.
Ace your marketing game: Practical strategies to win your customers
We have discussed useful tactics that are essential for assuring the healthy expansion of your company. Moving forward, we will discuss marketing tactics in this part that may help your firm achieve its goals.
1) Outreach your potential customers
It’s critical to position your company, brand, and product so that people will start looking for your services. In addition, it will enable your company to gather a sizable database without spending much money.
2) Call out paid advertisements
Moving forward with various paid advertisements is crucial if you want results quickly. In addition, these campaigns can be quite helpful in making sure that your target market is effectively targeted and catered to.
3) Launch discount coupons
It is advisable to constantly offer discount coupons for the audience if you want to get their attention. It will contribute to increasing customer interest in using your services.
Conclusion
Are you looking for professional guidance to go above and beyond what your rivals are doing? Want to work with the top developers of Uber clone apps? Want to design your taxi reservation system? If yes, pick Appicial without a doubt!
For the Android, iOS, and web platforms, we design, build, and roll out complete taxi booking app solutions. Visit Appicial to discover how to outcompete your rivals in the ride-hailing industry!
