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What are the potential benefits of Competitive Intelligence?
Home » Careers » Competitive Intelligence » What are the potential benefits of Competitive Intelligence?Posted by Your Guide on January 18, 2006 3:57 PM
There are numerous tools that businesses use as they engage in CI, but the primary focus of this article is upon the benefits and strategies of competitor analysis, which is still the primary focus of many CI programs. Particularly if your company hasn’t previously used CI, there are several benefits you may realize from the implementation of a CI program. Some of those benefits may include:
• Enhanced reaction time: Regardless of the scope of product testing and employee productivity analysis performed by a company, rapid market developments can force a company without CI to react to the market rather than anticipate market changes. In contrast, companies with solid CI will often know the general plans of their competitors before those moves affect the market.
• Improved R & D: Research and development within most companies is understandably driven by market research. However, if that market research is combined with intelligent competitor analysis the research and development team of a business is less likely to find its “new” products immediately outdated by those of competitors.
• Answers: No matter how small your specific business market is, if you have any competition at all you’ll likely face consumer questions about their products, policies and prices. In situations where those products or services are cheaper than yours, CI offers you the ability to prepare answers for your potential clients before they ask those questions.
• Legality and ethics: It’s at least possible that you or some of your employees already attempt to garner as much information as possible about your competitors. If such is the case, it’s important that you maintain legality at all times as your search for information. Using a provider that adheres to the strict ethical rules of the Society of Competitive Intelligence Professionals, or ensuring that your in-house CI employees undergo professional CI training, can help you avoid legal issues.
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