What to include in a competitive analysis
Clarke Ricks
School of Business, Liberty University
BUSI 690: Policy and Strategy in Global Competition
Dr. Hicks
April 6, 2022
What to include in a competitive analysis
The purpose of this type of analysis is to get a competitive advantage in the market and
improve your business strategy. Without a competitive analysis, it’s difficult to know what
others are doing to win clients or customers in your target market. A competitive analysis
report may include:
A description of your company’s target market
Details about your product or service versus the competitors’
Current and projected market share, sales, and revenues
Pricing comparison
Marketing and social media strategy analysis
Differences in customer ratings
You’ll compare each detail of your product or service versus the competition to assess
strategy efficacy. By comparing success metrics across companies, you can make data-driven
decisions.
How to do a competitive analysis
Follow these five steps to create your competitive analysis report and get a broad view
of where you fit in the market. This process can help you analyze a handful of competitors at
one time and better approach your target customers.
1. Create a competitor overview
In step one, select between five and 10 competitors to compare against your company.
The competitors you choose should have similar product or service offerings and a similar
business model to you. You should also choose a mix of both direct and indirect competitors
so you can see how new markets might affect your company. Choosing both startup and
seasoned competitors will further diversify your analysis.
Tip: To find competitors in your industry, use Google or Amazon to search for your
product or service. The top results that emerge are likely your competitors. If you’re a
startup or you serve a niche market, you may need to dive deeper into the rankings to find
your direct competitors.
2. Conduct market research
Once you know the competitors you want to analyze, you’ll begin in-depth market
research. This will be a mixture of primary and secondary research. Primary research comes
directly from customers or the product itself, while secondary research is information that’s
already compiled. Then, keep track of the data you collect in a user research template.
Primary market research may include:
Purchasing competitors’ products or services
Interviewing customers
Conducting online surveys of customers
Holding in-person focus groups
Secondary market research may include:
Examining competitors’ websites
Assessing the current economic situation
Identifying technological developments
Reading company records
Tip: Search engine analysis tools like Ahrefs and SEMrush can help you examine
competitors’ websites and obtain crucial SEO information such as the keywords they’re
targeting, the number of backlinks they have, and the overall health of their website.
3. Compare product features
The next step in your analysis involves a comparison of your product to your
competitors’ products. This comparison should break down the products feature by feature.
While every product has its own unique features, most products will likely include:
Price
Service offered
Age of audience served
Number of features
Style and design
Ease of use
Type and number of warranties
Customer support offered
Product quality
Tip: If your features table gets too long, abbreviate this step by listing the features you
believe are of most importance to your analysis. Important features may include cost,
product benefits, and ease of use.
4. Compare product marketing
The next step in your analysis will look similar to the one before, except you’ll compare
the marketing efforts of your competitors instead of the product features. Unlike the
product features matrix you created, you’ll need to go deeper to unveil each
company’s marketing plan.
Areas you’ll want to analyze include:
Social media
Website copy
Paid ads
Press releases
Product copy
As you analyze the above, ask questions to dig deeper into each company’s marketing
strategies. The questions you should ask will vary by industry, but may include:
What story are they trying to tell?
What value do they bring to their customers?
What’s their company mission?
What’s their brand voice?
Tip: You can identify your competitors’ target demographic in this step by referencing
their customer base, either from their website or from testimonials. This information can
help you build customer personas. When you can picture who your competitor actively
targets, you can better understand their marketing tactics.
5. Use a SWOT analysis
Competitive intelligence will make up a significant part of your competitor analysis
framework, but once you’ve gathered your information, you can turn the focus back to your
company. A SWOT analysis helps you identify your company’s strengths and weaknesses. It
also helps turn weaknesses into opportunities and assess threats you face based on your
competition.
During a SWOT analysis, ask yourself:
What do we do well?
What could we improve?
Are there market gaps in our services?
What new market trends are on the horizon?
Tip: Your research from the previous steps in the competitive analysis will help you
answer these questions and fill in your SWOT analysis. You can visually present your findings
in a SWOT matrix, which is a four-box chart divided by category.
6. Identify your place in the market landscape
The last step in your competitive analysis is to understand where you stand in the
market landscape. To do this, you’ll create a graph with an X and Y axis. The two axes should
represent the most important factors for being competitive in your market.
