Competition is one of the best things you see in business, sports, and many other aspects of life and those who make it to the highest ranks are typically the most competitive people you’ll ever meet. In this article we discuss 10 reasons why it’s important to compete in business.

 #1 Competition Brings Out the Best in You

When going against someone who is 10 times better, you realize all of a sudden you’re not as good like thought you were. It motivates you to fight, to pick up your game. It will cause you to ask, “How are we going to compete with these guys? We’ve got to figure out a way to get better.” Competition brings out the best in us.

 #2 The Pain of Losing is a Great Motivator

The pain of losing is one of the greatest motivators of a competitor. Think of it this way. I can guarantee that if you sit down and have a private conversation with people who say that competition isn’t good for you, if they’re willing to be open, you’ll learn that they had a very painful loss at some point in their lives. They lost in a way that was painful, and the situation could be not only painful, but embarrassing if it happened in public. And they chose to let that pain and embarrassment define them. Everyone who competes on a very high level has had painful losses.  Let the pain cause you to compete and get better—so you can take your business to the next level.

 #3 Competition Keeps You Young

Those who are engaged in the game stay young because they’re not rusting out. Some people are worried about burning out, but it’s rather burn out than rust out. It’s better to be in the game rather than sitting around and just watching everything any day of the week. Competition keeps you young, and you’ve got to stay young in order to keep up with everybody else.

#4 Competition Distracts You from Problems in Your Life

Have you ever dwelt so deeply on your problems that it almost drove you nuts?

Competition will act as a positive distraction. Everyone in life has distractions. Competition is a positive distraction and it takes you into the game so much that you don’t have time to be thinking about all the problems and possibilities of the world coming to an end. You don’t have time for that, because you are engaged and busy competing.

 #5 When You Compete, You Build New Relationships

Being a competitor keeps you up to date with what’s happening in the market as well as being aware of future opportunities. It’s extremely important to know who your competitors are in order to provide better service to clients and maintain a competitive attitude that will help attract future businesses.

#6 When You Compete, You Earn Respect

Those starting up in business are generally young and hungry and I don’t necessarily mean young in age. They could be 42 years old, but they’re young in business. You can see the competitive look in their eyes. But the more established people have eyes that are a little bit droopy. They’ve lost the fire. But the other person who’s coming up keeps doing whatever they can; even though they keep losing, they don’t give up. These people who don’t give up earn a lot of respect from everybody.

 #7 When You Compete, Your Brain Gets Wired in Improvement Mode

When you are competitive your mind will constantly be thinking about the various ways you can improve your services as well as methods of introducing new ones. You always have to find out what competitors are doing and you want to improve on that. This will help make your customers even more satisfied and even enable you to attract new ones.

 #8 When You Compete, You Find Fulfillment

Competition will push you to your physical and mental limits, so you can reach your full potentials as a person and a professional. You will be rewarded by winning over clients and making more businesses will lead to more revenues.

 #9 Competition Attracts Opportunity

When you’re competitive and focused on improving and pushing a little more than the rest, you’re guaranteed to move up. Competitive people are very valuable because they always want to figure out how to do things faster or better.

#10 You Eventually Beat 95% of Your Competitors

And last but not the least, competing can put you in a position wherein you’ll end up beating 95% of your competitors. Eventually you’ll find yourself only competing with the remaining 5% which is equivalent to a dog fight. It’ll enable you to improve faster, recruit the right talent, be part of the right team, acquire a clear vision of where you’re heading, and increase you chances of winning because you keep on competing.