This presentation was given by Corelia Kostovic, Digital Strategist & Market Analyst, during the first edition Women Techmakers in Montreal in March 12st. One of the reasons why SaaS startups fail to convince investors is because they underestimate the competition. Prior to and throughout the investment process, investors are constantly challenging entrepreneurs so they can master their market, from building their customer base to outmaneuvering their competitors, to ensure the success of their product. In the mean time, startups enter the market and disrupt traditional stakeholders. Established IT companies are fundamentally challenged as well, and should be keenly aware of these startups' activities to evaluate if they are a serious threat, or an M&A opportunity. Therefore, innovation is the greatest pressure faced in IT, because it defines our competitive advantage in terms of product strategy and customer satisfaction. Competitive Intelligence (CI) and Market Research (MR) are key methods to: - understand your customers' expectations: key buying criteria, buyer persona,…; - anticipate your competition: "killer features", buyer preferences, developer interviewing,…; - keeping an eye innovation: patents, trends,… The goals of this conference are to: - Introduce different methods in CI and MR; - Give you the keys to apply it clearly in your company; - Share external case studies (including Amadeus IT Group, and Montreal-based companies); - Share our internal case study at CleverToday.

1. Competitive Intelligence and Market
Research in IT
How to Apply it for IT Companies and SaaS startups
Corélia Kostovic
Digital Strategist, Market Analyst
CleverToday

2. My surprise when coming to Québec
Competition is not really considered
Few data are available (sales, capital, etc)
Companies don’t really keep an eye on their
own online reputation or comments

3. But IT companies in Quebec want to be
more competitive...
1. Adopting a competitive and scalable tax environment
2. Optimizing business processes and treatment of tax measures and tax credits
3. Supporting distribution and export
http://www.aqt.ca/fr/laqt-presente-ses-recommandations-pour-que-les-entreprises-dici-cessent-detre-penalisees-face-leurs
“Recommandations for local companies to
stop being penalized by their main Canadian
and international competitors”

4. Indeed, nobody lives in a vacuum. Ever.

5. What is Competitive Intelligence?

6. Competitive Intelligence is not...
only about competitors only for big companies just a one-time study

7. Competitive Intelligence is a methodology

8. Competitive Intelligence is a mindset

9. Use all the information available around you
Sources
Human
sourcesPublic
instituti.
Biz
press
Internet,
social
media
Deep
Web Patents
Source
code

10. Share all you know with sales, dev,
managers,...

11. Why is it so important in IT? (1/ 2)

12. Why is it so important in IT? (2/2)
STARTUPS
Convince investors
Quick responding competitors
LARGER COMPANIES
Anticipate market change
Prospect M&A opportunities
Bigger competitors

13. Then, how about Market
Research?

14. The best clue is THE USER
DEMAND USAGE TIMING

15. Market research techniques in IT
FOCUS GROUPS ONLINE SURVEY CONCEPT TESTING
QUALITY FUNCTION
DEPLOYMENT
LEAD USERS
PROTOTYPE TESTING
CUSTOMER VISIT EMPATHIC DESIGN

16. What often goes wrong with new techno?

17. Then, combine Competitive Intelligence and
Market Research results

18. How do the others
perform CI?

19. Amadeus IT Group and innovation analysis

20. How about us?

21. How we collect information for internal
purposes
For the sales team:
● Strategic networking events
● Who is making business with who (Agencies mandates)
● Due diligence on serious prospects
For programmers:
● Key market indicators on a product, a competitor or a technology

22. How we decided not to invest the APM
market
Monitoring solution prototype developed internally:
We did:
● Study the APM market
● Select the right sources of information to get
trends (APM Digest)
● Test competitors product and pricing
● Read documentation

23. A special message
to women

26. Merci :-)
Corélia KOSTOVIC
Digital Strategist
corelia@clevertoday.com
514-582-7880