I would actually question why anyone needs to beat the market at all. The industry and the media place far too much emphasis on it. It’s actually very difficult to do over the long term, and only a tiny fraction of investors achieve it on a cost- and risk-adjusted basis, including the professionals. In my view, it’s far better simply to capture the market return as cheaply and efficiently as possible.
Picking individual stocks is a bad idea. After costs, it’s extremely hard to outperform the broader market. It’s also very time-consuming. I would always recommend investing instead in a low-cost index fund or passively managed ETF, and to enjoy both the risk and return benefits of broad diversification.
Factor-based investing has not had a particularly good run, but there is plenty of peer-reviewed academic evidence to show that tilting to factors such as size, value and profitability can be a good strategy over the very long term. It does come with a higher degree of volatility, though, so there’s a definite trade-off. But it’s far, far better to use a low-cost factor funds than to pick stocks.