© 2019 All Rights Reserved
© 2019 All Rights Reserved
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About Cookies OKWhat is Competitive Intelligence
This is an extract from a lecture we gave to MBAs, business school students & graduates at the University of Westminster in London. Watch for a taste or click here for the full lecture.
We’ve done many other presentations including Zoom / online presentations and webinars. You can view more on our Videos / Webinars page which includes a 2024 talk on how AI (artificial intelligence) can be used to support competitive intelligence.
Contact us if you would also like us to talk to your employees or students on any aspect of competitive or marketing intelligence.
Businesses (and people) over time develop habits and patterns of working. Sometimes these lead to success. However often they stop management from seeing reality – especially when the business environment changes. Competitive intelligence can identify these business blindspots – both in the company itself, and in its competitors. Taking advantage of competitor blindspots is a major way that a company can beat its competitors, so it is crucial to understand one’s own blindspots so as to protect oneself from possible attack.
Business problems can be shown through humour. Humour allows businesses to take a step back and see a problem applied to a situation that appears different to their own. One can also sometimes see similar behaviour in one’s own organisation – thus highlighting a possible blindspot. Humour is just one technique for showing blindspots. Others include the use of drama workshops and story-telling, or war-gaming where the business environment is modelled and management try and take an external look at themselves and their competitive situation.
The following “stories” and office “theories” are taken from our humour database – with a random selection shown. Refresh the page for further examples.
Julius Caesar - My last job involved a lot of office politics and back stabbing. I'd like to get away from all that.
Jesse James - I can list among my experience and skills:
Lucretia Borgia - My greatest accomplishment? After I took over the department, our competition just seemed to drop out of sight one by one.
Pandora - I can bring a lot to your company. I like discovering new things.
Genghis Khan - My primary talent is downsizing. On my last job, I downsized my staff, my organization, and the populations of several countries.
Macbeth - Would I go after my boss's job? Do I look like the kind of guy who would knock off his boss for a promotion?
Lady Godiva - What do mean this isn't business casual?
Elvis - My last boss and I... say, are you going to eat those fries?
Just because the Resume / CV looks good does not mean it wasn't embellished. And even if the interview went well, the candidate could have lied. Rather than take the risk, take up the references!
Businesses (and people) over time develop habits and patterns of working. Sometimes these lead to success. However often they stop management from seeing reality – especially when the business environment changes. Competitive intelligence can identify these business blindspots – both in the company itself, and in its competitors. Taking advantage of competitor blindspots is a major way that a company can beat its competitors, so it is crucial to understand one’s own blindspots so as to protect oneself from possible attack.
Business problems can be shown through humour. Humour allows businesses to take a step back and see a problem applied to a situation that appears different to their own. One can also sometimes see similar behaviour in one’s own organisation – thus highlighting a possible blindspot. Humour is just one technique for showing blindspots. Others include the use of drama workshops and story-telling, or war-gaming where the business environment is modelled and management try and take an external look at themselves and their competitive situation.
The following “stories” and office “theories” are taken from our humour database – with a random selection shown. Refresh the page for further examples.
Robert Smith was devastated. As the owner of a small retail business selling various groceries he had always recognised the threat posed by major supermarket chains such as Tesco, Walmart, Lidl, Carrefour and the like. Now a branch of Tesco had opened next door, and business was tailing off. He told all his friends how worried he was - and that things couldn't possibly be worse. And then a few months later, a branch of Walmart opened on the other side.
Robert now told friends that he expected to be out of business within the year.
His friends were really surprised when they met him a few months later - getting out of a top-range Mercedes wearing an expensive suit and with a big smile on his face.
We thought business was so bad that you were about to go bankrupt. What happened?
Robert replied: Well that is what I thought. And then I remembered that one secret to effective marketing is to make sure that your potential customers know where to find you. So I changed the name of my company. Come and look!
Robert's friends followed him to his shop, sandwiched between Tesco and Walmart. Over the front, the new name was posted in big neon letters ENTRANCE
How do you promote your business? Can potential customers find you? Do your marketing promotions send people away, or invite them to come and buy. You need to ensure that all your marketing promotions allow customers to enter..
