Earlier in the week I shared my thoughts on how to better understand the competition. The following are sources you can turn to for competitive information:
• Competitor websites
• Press releases (there are free online services that can send you daily e-mail messages with press releases on industries and topics of interest to you)
• Industry analyst reports
• Financial analyst reports
• News clipping services
• FIND/SVP (consulting and research services) and other similar services
• Harte-Hanks, Hoovers, One Source and other company databases
• Online database searching services, such as FirstSearch, ProQuest and Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe
• Services that track advertising spending
• Search engines and intelligent agents
• Blogs, chat rooms, message boards, podcasts and discussion groups
• Trade magazines
• Trade shows
• Competitor direct mail campaigns (add a friend or relative to their lists)
• Your field sales force. Responding to the information they send encourages them to send more
• Ex-employees from those firms (may be under your employ now, or from job search databases)
• Current customers (many will pass on competitive communications they receive)
• Primary and secondary research (qualitative and quantitative, including brand equity studies). Make sure to investigate syndicated studies.
• Self-purchase and use of their products (become one of their customers). Your management team should buy and use competitive products – an excellent way to better understand your competitors’ customer experiences.
• Market tours. If in retail, visit stores that carry your competitors’ products and talk with the sales associates about their products and services and what the companies are like to work with.
• Competitive intelligence firms
Can you think of others?
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2 comments
Robert Payne
October 4, 2007 at 11:16 am
RSS feeds. I just subscribed to your’s! ;~)
Brad Shorr
October 6, 2007 at 9:14 am
You have a very thorough list. One other possibility that you touch on is joining trade organizations or buying groups. Their meetings, publications, and conventions give you an opportunity to learn from other customers in an environment very conducive to frank discussion.
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