What can help me perform competitive research and find the gaps in my competitors’ strategies?

This is an answer to a question submitted to the “Ask me anything (AMA)” program. This AMA channel is designed to support you get clarity to business/tech questions you may have. Periodically, I select a particular response that we feel can benefit the broader community.

Purposeful observation is your biggest companion!

1. Make sure you are clear on your business purpose — What is the value your business/product is there to provide.
2. Determine your target customer. Can you identify them by role?
3. Can you complete the following sentence:

The purpose of ______<Product>________ is to enable _____________<WHO> to be ___________Faster_________ at doing ____________________. This is acheived by ____________________

or

The purpose of ______<Product>________ is to enable _____________<WHO> find it easier and more convenient to ____________________. This is achieved by ____________________

Basically are you clear around:

• What are you trying to achieve?
• How you are trying to achieve?
• Who are you impacting?
• What aspect of their life are you impacting (Ability to do more, more easily? Ability to do more, faster?, ability to simplify their life (i.e. convenience)?

Once you are clear on the above then add

• How are you trying to reach your target audience?
• How are you talking to your audience?
• How great are you at it?

Now that you are clear on what you are doing, you can evaluate your competitor#s effectiveness in terms of:

• the product they provide.
• the methods they use to reach the target audience (direct, channel etc).
• the capabilities they use to help customers achieve success.
• the mistakes they did.
• the reviews their clients give them.
• their sales copy.
• their investment pitches.

This way you can compare the market, feature/function, go-to-market capabilities and more! Leverage tools such as Owler, LinkedIn etc. There are many that can help you fill in the blanks.

Good luck

NOTE: Views are my own, based on my observations and experiences. I believe in productive discourse and welcome opportunities to refine my understanding through discussion. Comment in the comments area below or reach out on hi@andremuscat.com