I’ve written previously, more than once, on competitor intelligence (CI).
The fact is, CI is only a part of a broader subject – the marketing environment.
It is the height of folly to try and market something without studying the environment into which you are trying to market.
Besides the competition and what they are doing, it includes the potential target markets, and everything useful you can find out about them. It includes potential marketing channels, their pluses and minuses.
The amount of study you can do or must do varies. But I’ll give you an example of an absolute minimum. If you are doing a Yellow Page ad, study last year’s book, the section or possible sections into which your ad might go.
What other ads are running, and what do they look like, how big are they? What colors do they use? Do they use pictures of people? What buttons are they trying to push?
But also, if I run different sized ads, where can I expect them to be placed? What is the potential if I run two smaller ads instead of one larger one?
Another example. Planning a direct mail campaign to dentists, I had a dentist friend save two weeks worth of junk mail. Not just competitive junk mail, ALL junk mail. Then I knew what to do to get noticed amongst the garbage.
This is VERY fruitful in terms of improving the effectiveness of a marketing effort.