One of the most challenging tasks you’ll face is discovering information about your competitors.
This is something that you can not just go to their website and evaluate their business concept. Of course, you should do that, but this is just a starting point. There are still many other aspects to find out, like how much competitors spend on maintaining customers, their profit margins, how many customers they have, their growth techniques, and so forth.
Suppose your competitors are private organizations (most of the time is true). In that case, it is more difficult for you because private companies don’t have to reveal the kinds of information that public companies do.
Here’s some of the information you may want to gather on your competitors:
Style of the management of the company
It is essential to understand the leadership and management style of your competitors to understand better their strategies and how they operate. You can research the backgrounds of their executives and key players to learn about their experience and expertise. Additionally, you can observe how they interact with their employees and customers and look for patterns in their decision-making processes.
Existing market strategies —it would be good if you find out what they’ve done to understand their trends over time.
It is also important to assess the products and services and find unique features and benefits for the company’s customer segments.
Searching on the internet
When searching on the internet, don’t rely on just google search; try to go beyond that.
The following website might be an alternative solution:
To find out about public companies, you can use these websites:
Resources for the Portuguese market:
regarding finding information about private companies, you can use these websites:
www.inc.com: fastest-growing private companies in the U.S.
www.fuld.com: This site gives you advice on seeking competitive intelligence and has many links to information on specific industries.
www.profnet.com: This site provides a direct link to experts at universities, colleges, corporations, and national laboratories.
www.elibrary.com: This is an excellent site if you’re looking for articles, reference works, and news wires. You can request a free trial.
You can also look for data at government websites:
www.commerce.gov: Here, you’ll find everything you want to know about the U.S. economy.
www.bls.gov: This is another site full of information on the economy, particularly the labor market.
Networking is essential: the internet is not the only option to find information. Take every opportunity to talk with people in the industry that you are interested in. They are on the front lines daily, and they will give you information that is probably more current than what you’ll find in the media or on the internet.
