Competitive intelligence is whereby a company uses its resources to analyze information concerning its industry, business space, competition, and products and services. This gives a company a competitive edge and pushes its agenda a step ahead of the other companies.
Ethical Competition
Without control, competitive intelligence could quickly become a dirty game with companies using unethical and illegal means to stay ahead of their competitors. However, with the correct legal and just standards, a company can outwit its competition.
Importance of Competitive Intelligence
Competitive intelligence helps organizations of various sizes in a number of ways which include:
- It helps businesses predict challenges and opportunities
- It helps companies stay ahead of their competitor
- It helps businesses identify loopholes in different sections of their products, services, or even staff.
- Enhances continuous innovation for companies in the same field.
How to Gather Information for Competitive Intelligence
There are many ways you can use to gather useful information on a competitor that include:
- Gather information from competitors’ websites, press releases, and social media posts.
- Source from job posts that would indicate efforts to grow a particular area in a company or discover a new product or service that requires new personnel.
- Surveys that include competitors’ products and services.
- Company information aggregators such as Dun and Bradstreet
- Talking to people inside and outside the company
However extensive the information gathered may be, it is not helpful if not analyzed and drawn from it. Companies must reach conclusions and make strategies with the intelligence they gather.
Five Emerging Trends in Competitive Intelligence
These are the current emerging trends in competitive intelligence. They include:
1. Shift to Focus on Market Intelligence Rather Than Competitive Intelligence
As crucial as competitive intelligence is, it has become necessary to track and follow the market. It has become a common success factor that companies must track changes to the markets. Tracking the market helps you note when brand perception changes and when there is a shift in how clients view your products. E.g., YouTube uses market intelligence to control targeted advertising to ensure whichever ad the viewer sees; they have a higher chance of clicking on it.
2. Increase in Budget Allocation for Competitive Intelligence.
As the field of CI grows, so does the team and resources allocated for its increase. There are more job openings for experienced personnel in the area with huge payouts. More and more firms are seeing the importance of leveraging CI to grow their businesses.
3. Growth of Data Not Matching Insight
With the ease of access to data today, volumes of data are being collected every second worldwide. However, analysis to gain greater insight into the information needs more resources and expertise. Otherwise, the data is just data. It is essential to utilize CI platforms such as Netbase Quid, which have expert systems and personnel to help analyze this data and convert it into necessary and usable insight.
4. Sales Teams Are Growing Hungry for Intelligence and Help With Messaging
Salespeople are growing hungry for data on their competitors to leverage the data to gain an advantage and increase their sales. They also need help with understanding their target clients to better structure their sales message pitch for better feedback and customer retention.
Industries Leveraging Competitive Intelligence
- Airlines such as Virgin Atlantic and the sky team use CI to change their flight tickets based on several pieces of external information.
- Tech startups use CI to disrupt markets by outperforming traditional giants in specific niche segments.
- Sports analytics leveraged for success over opponents like how Oakland Athletics had great success despite operating on a lean budget.
Netbase Quid is the next-generation consumer and market intelligence platform, delivering contextual insights to reveal business trends, connect with consumers, and understand the story behind competitors and the market.
Competitive intelligence can significantly grow a business when leveraged well. It applies to all industries and may be a significant success determinant.
