Efficient Competitor Analysis Studies

Vamsi Batchu examines the benefits of performing competitive analysis and reveals a step-by-step process for analysis study

Generally whenever a product is being developed by a company, one of the most important aspects to deal with early on is to understand the generic landscape where the product will compete. This can be achieved by performing a competitive analysis study. This also helps the business to compare the product’s unique features against the competition in the market, identify potential user types/personas and, most importantly, gain a view on their visual language styles.

Let’s look at a few advantages of the analysis when it comes to the design aspect:

Helps the design teams to identify and solve common usability issues.

Informs the design process of the products out there in the market.

Helps provide concrete evidence to make product-based changes.

Focuses the business efforts on a target segment.

One thing to understand is that the analysis will inform about what is existing currently but not why it is existing. But this analysis itself is enough to understand a lot of insights and boost the brand value. Here is how it is done.

1. UNDERSTAND THE ANALYSIS GOALS

The first step of the analysis is listing out the goals of performing the research/study of the competitors. Questions such as the research impact on the product design should be asked with the stakeholders before starting. Make sure that your goals are as specific as possible and all the goals that are laid out must be accessible in the future.

This enables you to consider the loopholes the business is planning to address with the study. Make a list of the goals and add them to the product map so that they can be referred to whenever there is a misalignment. A few examples of the goals could be:

Understanding the pricing strategy of the competitor products.

Determining what social media channels are being used by the users in the platform.

2. TARGET YOUR ANALYSIS