Business Intelligence, Competitive Intelligence

1. Developing A Good Business Competitive
Analysis
Almost every business operates in an environment characterized with heavy or light competition.
A business organization must therefore be keen on engaging in activities that promote
competitiveness in order to attract a wider client base than its competitors. To achieve this
successfully, strategic plans have to be formulated and put in place. This requires the
management of the firm to be equipped with the right information about its competition.
Business competitive analysis is a useful tool used by managers to gain business intelligence.
How well this competitive intelligence process is undertaken determines how successful the
business becomes in handling the information gathered. The ability of your business to collect
and interpret business intelligence plays a very important role in this process.

2. A great competitive analysis tool is a report about the actual market’s path that your organization
should pass through so as to be successful. The best person to derive this type of a report is a

3. person who is market savvy. One requires being very objective and being in a position to
conduct fearless and extensive market research. Business competition analysis is usually a
powerful tool for strategic planning of your organization. But how do you create a good business
competitive analysis?
Developing a Profile of Competitors
The analysis should begin by compiling a profile of your competitors which mostly contains the
companies you consider your chief competitors both in the online world and off-line. While
doing this, it is important to pay attention to other firms that compete indirectly with your firm.
These are firms that may not sell similar products or services but ones that aim for similar
customer capital as yours. You might also be needed to include detailed information of
companies that plan to enter your industry in the following year. After compiling a good profile
of competitors, you should then identify those firms that pose the greatest challenge.
Develop Product Summary of the Competitors
This entails gathering and analyzing the products and services of the competition. What is their
value proposition? You should concentrate on evaluating the features, value and the targets of
the competitors’ products and services. Find out pertinent information such as your competitors
ways to sell their commodities, their marketing strategies, their customer satisfaction levels as
well as the opinion that your consumers have about your competitors. This way you will know
how easy or difficult it is for your customers to switch to your competitors. You can rely on
information about competitors’ products from the consumer surveys done by different
recognized bodies among a plethora of additional resources. It is also important for you to find
information about how your competitors conduct distribution and advertisement of their
commodities. In addition, you should pay attention to discussions pertaining product quality of
your competitors as well as how they conduct their staffing.
Strategies and Objectives of Your Competitors
Look for a way to uncover the objectives and strategies of your competitors. Such information
can be obtained from advertisements as well as periodic reports of competition. However, you
should be ready to do more than this in order beat your competition. Above all, focus on
obtaining facts, remain persistent and always have confidence in your instincts to assist you in
your decision making.