Gone are the days when a team used to sit for hours in front of a computer desk analyzing hundreds of websites and Excel sheets and evaluating the competitors. Analyzing competitors and monitoring their tactics has become super easy with the emergence of automation and artificial intelligence. 

Introducing competitor marketing intelligence is one of the most important transformations that organizations are focusing on. It is because it provides the most crucial information for a business to understand competitor's strategies and stay one step ahead of them. 

Let’s understand how competitor intelligence in social media for action can enhance any brand’s chances of success. 

Understanding Competitor Marketing Intelligence 

Competitor marketing intelligence aims to collect, evaluate, and draw insights that can help gain an advantage in advancing competition. It is similar to business intelligence, with a minor difference. 

Business intelligence primarily deals with the data generated within the organization, but competitor intelligence deals with external data describing the competitor's business. It focuses on understanding competitor's strategies and assists businesses in crafting better and more strategic sales and marketing campaigns. 

For instance, if your organization notices that your competitor is doing something different on its website, your marketing team may suggest or try to do the same. However, with competitor intelligence analysis on your side, you can do better than your competitor. 

Competitor intelligence analysis will research and help make decisions based on intelligent recommendations. This way, your team doesn't have to wait for upper management orders and eliminates the chances of walking on a path without expert consultation. 

Closed-Loop Cycle of Competitor Intelligence Working

The competitor intelligence analysis works on a closed-loop cycle based on six phases: 

1. Define: The first step is to define the specific needs, metrics, and key areas for intelligence research. 
2. Research: Now, this phase is an intelligence-gathering phase. Competitor intelligence analysts use competitor analysis tools to gather as much data about competitors as possible.
3. Analyze: In this phase, the competitor intelligence analyzes the data comprehensively to fetch out information. 
4. Recommend: Competitor intelligence presents information in a simplified way and suggests recommendations based on the insights.
5. Act: This is the phase where your team implements the recommendations offered by competitive intelligence.
6. Optimize: This is the most important yet overlooked phase. Analysts need to seek feedback and improve the quality of recommendations provided by competitor intelligence. 

How to Make Competitor Intelligence Strategy More Effective? By Including Social Media

Social Media is a core part of every consumer's life, and this is an important platform where brands can connect with customers through 1:1 means and vice versa. Hence, this platform is overflowing with all the insights and information about what a particular target audience likes, dislikes, and future trends they wish to see.
 
Furthermore, marketers don't leave a chance to utilize this platform to its maximum. Here are the different types of information that organizations can take from social media to feed their competitor intelligence analysis: 

• Engagement Rates

Understanding the engagement rates on competitors' social media posts can help analyze which content resonates with the audience. This information allows marketers to evaluate their efforts and adjust their strategies to boost customer engagement rates.

• Post Frequency

Competitor intelligence can analyze the frequency of posting and the type of content they share can help understand the competitor's secret of maximizing the content's reach. With this information, you can streamline your strategy and increase or decrease the frequency of your posts. 

• Audience Demographics

Getting an idea of competitors' audience demographics can help businesses understand what type of content should be posted on which platform. It can also help them prioritize which platforms to increase organic traffic and engagement rates. 

Wrapping up

To make competitor intelligence implementation in your operations a success, you require robust, resilient, and comprehensive tools and platforms. SBL Corp can help you with that. From offer consulting services to assist in your build a top-notch competitor intelligence platform, we can be your guiding light. You can leave all the heavy work on our shoulders. While you focus on your core competencies, we work from behind to make your operations more streamlined and advanced. Book an appointment today!