This is the material that was presented for session OA-1110 , "Competitive Intelligence on a Shoestring Budget", at Product Camp Austin July 20th 2013.
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Competitive Intelligence on a Shoestring Budget (July 2013 Product Camp Austin)
1. Competitive Intelligence on a
Shoestring Budget
Product Camp Austin #11 – July 2013
Doug Fierro
dhfierro@gmail.com
2.
3. Guidelines
• This session will focus on how to gather raw competitive intelligence
data
• Focused on B2B companies
• How you organize the data, prioritize vendors, gain insights, and
publish it for internal stakeholder usage is enough work for separate
session in the future!
• Never misrepresent who you are during your competitive research
(registering for webinars, interacting at trade shows, etc.)
• Basically anything published and publicly available on the internet is
fair game
• Don’t be afraid to talk to other vendors and customers at trade
shows, conferences, etc.
• You can get juicy information watching two vendors (or customers of
competing vendors) battling it out in public!
• The competitive landscape is always changing- this is not a one-
time effort to be set aside afterwards
• Don’t be afraid of larger companies with more resources than you
4. Where To Start?
• Internet search is the fastest and easiest way to start
gathering information about a company or a product:
• Set up a recurring Google Alert (google.com/alerts)
• Search suggestions:
– Company name
– Product name(s)
– Target market or industry
– Names of visible employees who are often quoted or speak at
presentations (Directors, CTO, VP, CEO, etc.)
• However, there are plenty of other good sources of data
that are beyond a simple internet search…
5. Other Sources
• In no particular order:
– Company website and press releases
– YouTube (especially the comments section!)
– Community forums & groups (online and local / regional meetings)
– Published articles and reviews
– Trade shows and events
– Your own employees – sales, services, marketing, etc.
• Includes win/loss analysis
– Published knowledge bases, manuals, release notes
– Sign up on company sponsored mailing lists, groups (LinkedIn), etc.
– Developer forums, APIs, support & partner portals
– Resumes and job postings
– Public SEC filings (S1s, 10Ks, etc.)
– Partners & resellers
– Investment / venture capital resources & funding
– Leveraging Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) laws
• http://www.nfoic.org/state-foi-resources
– Search on terms like “I hate <product>” or “<product>sucks.com”
6. What To Capture
• Because Product Management serves many internal
stakeholders, you should capture a wide range of
information and only publish what is relevant for your
target audience
• Suggestions:
• Keep one master summary list with basic fields /
columns to track
– Company name, HQ, website link, product(s), frequency
encountered, win/losses, brief description, # customers, #
employees, $ revenue, threat level, funding history
• For a subset of vendors, do a deeper analysis
• Produce consumable material for sales, marketing, etc.
– Have internal vs. external versions of each analysis produced
8. Intelligence Gathering Example
• Let’s pick a hypothetical company to gain
competitive intelligence on
• Press release info last few months:
– New VP of sales on July 9th
– IPO offering May 22nd
– New 8.0 release on March 23rd
– Lots of customer deal announcements vs. “fluff”
releases like surveys, awards, events, etc.
• Let’s drill down on the IPO announcement…
9. SEC Filing Example
• Public companies have to file certain forms with the SEC
• Search on SEC forms here:
– http://www.sec.gov/edgar/searchedgar/companysearch.html
• The Tableau S1 (Amended) reveals quite a bit about their company and
products:
– Over 12,000 customers, and some larger ones are named
– Top line growth of 93% from 2010 to 2012 ($34M/$62M/$128M)
– Recently invested in APIs to support partner ecosystem
– Employee growth from 749 in Dec 2012 to 843 in March 2013
• 360 are in sales and mktg; 227 in development; 82 in services; 63 in G&A;
– Percentage of revenue that is maintenance vs. new license
– List of their perceived competitors
– Deals over $100K increased from 111 in 2012 to 239 in 2012
– They are currently developing a SaaS offering- Tableau Online
– 83% of their total revenue in 2012 was derived from North America
– Plan to expand internationally (target countries listed) and focus sales to public
sector
– Financial health - $40M in cash and short term assets
– 90% of licenses are perpetual vs. 10% term; maint fees avg 25% of license costs
– Over 90% of their sales staff are direct vs. channel sales
– Architecture overview and products offered
– Growth strategy
– …and more !
10. Posted Job Listings & Descriptions
• You can find out about
how a company is
organized, skills
dependencies, where
they are expanding
hiring, and locations by
looking at job postings
• Also resumes of former
employees can reveal
product and company
information of interest
11. YouTube Research
• No budget to travel to a trade show or event?
• Lots of Tableau videos created by the vendor and others: demos,
tutorials, customer testimonies, etc.
12. Pricing
• Tableau GSA pricing schedule published by a reseller:
• http://www.triadtechpartners.com/wp-content/uploads/Tableau-GSA-
Price-List-April-2013.pdf
14. Find Out What Users Are Saying…
• There is no substitute for real world customer commentary and testimony!
• Find discussion forums that are not vendor sponsored
• Example: http://tableaufriction.blogspot.com/
15. Find Out What Users Are Saying…
• Here is another example : http://www.networking-forum.com/
16. Watch Others Battle It Out In Public
• Entertaining, but not a recommended best practice
17. I Love To Hate ….
• There is strong correlation between public dislike of a company or
product and the amount of negative information available to research!
18. What About Small Private
Companies?
• More difficult, but not
impossible
• Crunchbase is a
good place to start if
they have received
any funding in the
past…
20. Tips and Resources Provided
During Session
• Other resources:
• www.newsle.com
• www.glassdoor.com
• www.Indeed.com
• www.datasift.com
• www.rapportive.com
• AngelList (angel.co)
• Read fine print of published product terms and
conditions!
• (sorry if I missed yours!)
