PT Toronto #4: Tom Walsham (Director of Product at TWG) shares his talk “Competitors, Comparables & Corpses : A framework for exploiting the competitive landscape."
20240507 QFM013 Machine Intelligence Reading List April 2024.pdf
Competitors, Comparables & Corpses | Tom Walsham | ProductTank Toronto
1. Tom Walsham / @tomwalsham - - Sep 20th, 2016
A framework for exploring and exploiting
the competitive landscape
Competitors,
Comparables
& Corpses
2. Tom Walsham
Director of Product
The Working Group
@tomwalsham
30 Years writing Code
15 Years working in Digital Product
10 Starts annually with TWG clients
WHY SHOULD I LISTEN TO THIS GUY?
3. Those solving similar problems for a
similar user baseCompetitors
Those using similar techniques to solve
problems in different domainsComparables
Those who have failed attempting to do
exactly what you’re tryingCorpses
EVERYONE ALWAYS FORGETS THE CORPSES
@tomwalsham
5. Forget about your competitors,
Just focus on your customers.
“
- Jack Ma, Founder Alibaba
@tomwalsham
OBEY THE FINGER
6. We watch our competitors, learn from
them, see the things that they were
doing for customers and copy those
things as much as we can
“
LOOK AT THAT STARE. HE WATCHES EVERYTHING
- Jeff Bezos, CEO Amazon
@tomwalsham
7. I’LL KEEP THE SPORTING ANALOGIES TO A MINIMUM
@tomwalsham
Competition is Interdependent
8. OK, LAST SPORTS ANALOGY, PROMISE
@tomwalsham
Tactics Only Make
Sense in Context
9. THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK
@tomwalsham
“Steve Blank” Petal Diagram
https://steveblank.com/2013/11/08/a-new-way-to-look-at-competitors/
11. If you make anything good,
you're going to have competitors …
You can only avoid competition by
avoiding good ideas.
“
VERY ORANGE SLIDE
- Paul Graham, Y Combinator
@tomwalsham
13. SOMEONE ACTUALLY HAS THEIR BUSINESS ON A .net DOMAIN
@tomwalsham
Tool : AlternativeTo.net
Search for alternatives, see
ratings and reviews,
targeted traffic source
14. OR GOOGLE DOCS, FOR THE COOL KIDS
@tomwalsham
Excel is (probably) Your Competitor
15. BANANA AS USER METAPHOR
@tomwalsham
Learn From Their Users
http://www.artinthepicture.com/shop/Dolk/Shrink/
16. ALSO USEFUL FOR TRACKING HOW AWESOME YOU ARE YOURSELF
@tomwalsham
Tool : mention.com
Track your competitors
across Social Media, Blogs,
News.
17. NOT A GREAT EGG POACHING TECHNIQUE
@tomwalsham
Steal Their Customers
18. ALSO GOOD FOR LOOKING LIKE A KNOWLEDGE NINJA IN MEETINGS
@tomwalsham
Tool : BuiltWith.com
Company Tech Stacks, Find
SaaS Customers, Track
Trends
19. Caveat : Don’t
build someone else’s
idea
COVET NOT THY NEIGHBOUR’S TERRIBLE SITCOM STARTUP IDEA
@tomwalsham
34. ALSO DID NOT HAVE A HEADPHONE JACK
@tomwalsham
Timing
35. HOURS OF FUN LAUGHING AT OLD TWITTER LOGOS
@tomwalsham
Tool : archive.org
View snapshots of websites
over time, dating back to
pre-2000
36. I PICTURE A BUNCH OF OTHER CATS ALREADY IN THERE
@tomwalsham
Avoid
the
Avoidable
37. A CLASSIC EXAMPLE OF ‘SPREADSHEET AS PRODUCT’
@tomwalsham
Tool : autopsy.io
A collection of 130 (and
growing) post-mortems
from startups
See also : https://www.cbinsights.com/blog/startup-failure-post-mortem/
Autopsy.io
38. USE IT WHILE YOU STILL CAN!
@tomwalsham
Tool : Twitter
Reach out to individuals, ex-
founders, and connect in
person.
40. IF YOU FELL ASLEEP, JUST WRITE THIS DOWN. THAT’S PRETTY MUCH IT
@tomwalsham
A Framework?
• Scavenge from them
• Understand your place in history
• Don’t make the same mistakes
Competitors
• Find all of them
• Understand your/their customers
• Steal their customers
Comparables
• Create Differentiated Products
• Borrow their UX
• Learn from their Marketing
Corpses