Auditing the Competitive Landscape
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”
― Sun Tzu, The Art of War
The Challenge:
Learn what the top industry players are doing to capitalize on good strategies, to avoid bad ones, and to anticipate future steps
The Outcome:
A series of reports highlighting competitor strengths and weaknesses, values, and go-to-business approaches
The Impact:
Used locally and internationally for improved sales training, the first North American wargaming, and company-wide milestone setting
My Process:
Reverse engineering their results.
Utilizing marketing materials, websites, shareholder reports, and business insights to visually portray how the competition models their business
Accurately assessing the situation.
Building honest reviews of their internal strengths and weaknesses and external opportunities and threats, then analyzing how combinations of these characteristics might yield advantages, as well as places of vulnerability
Predicting the (predictable) future.
Determining what actions are most likely to be taken by the competition based on their motivations, capabilities, past reactions to outside forces, and previous successes in order to anticipate any confrontations ahead and how to best turn the tides in your favor
