Octopus Competitive Intelligence

The next in our series of Questions and Answers is Vivek Bhalla, a Market Intelligence professional at   MongoDB   and former Garner Research Director. MongoDB  is the leading modern, general-purpose database platform designed to unleash the power of software and data for developers and the applications they build. Headquartered in New York,  MongoDB  has more than 24,800 customers in over 100 countries. The  MongoDB  database platform has been downloaded over 155 million times, and there have been more than one million  MongoDB University  registrations. To find out more about MongoDB, visit their website –  www.mongodb.com 1.  In your view, what’s Competitive Intelligence?   Competitive Intelligence is a discipline that enables organizations to reduce strategic risk and increase revenue opportunities. This is achieved by having a deep understanding of one’s operating environment as well as adjacent markets that may be influen...

This post asks what’s Competitive Intelligence Question Storming and how to use it? It can be used in many situations and when preparing a Competitive Intelligence research project. Competitive Intelligence Question Storming is a great tool Question Storming is a great Competitive Intelligence tool for seeking more certainty for decisions. Especially if you not sure what to do. Why not sit with your team and look to use a tool which will give you better answers?  Great questions Great questions are the best way to create great intelligence. Yet, it’s not a case of thinking up a smart question to catch all about a competitor or market. You guild the decision-maker to take action. Without well thought out questions, it is unlikely that you will get the correct answers.  You’ve likely used Brain-Storming as a way to find solutions. Done well; it is a handy tool. But, sometimes, to get your team to think differently, ask them to use a different tool.  Brain-Storming Brainstor...

This post described how Competitor Research told them they were not ready for battle. It’s a Competitive Intelligence case study. The article presents how our services provided more certainty. And the confidence for significant supply chain business. You know how You know how you supply materials across the UK to a network of distribution centres? And you are getting very good at it. You start picking up other people stock. And you think why not offer this logistics network to other companies? But it’s a different market with new challenges. So you need a detailed market analysis of their potential industry. And more certainty on a key competitor. What we did A UK material supplier asked for an in-depth market analysis. And to take a look at an established competitor within European logistics.  What is Competitive Intelligence? Competitive intelligence is the finding, sorting and critical analysis of information. To make sense of what’s happening and why. Predict what’s going to ha...

Today we ask Octopus’s Graeme Dixon which Competitive Intelligence productivity tools do we use. All are not specifically Competitive Intelligence related, and everyone can use them.  Evernote Maybe it’s how my mind works, but this tool has everything. Notes, pics, silly ideas, projects, articles, web clippings all go into it. I also add most documents into Evernote. So everything is in one place and their in document search capability is excellent. £4 a month if you want to upgrade is a steal. Having 22,500 plus notes on  Evernote  they need to be organised. So I file my notes into the following notebooks: Evernote Notebooks @inbox.  – @ in front, so the notebook is at the top of the list. Here I put every incoming note—a note from an email, a web clipping or direct. When I have time, I then sort the messages into other notebooks.  1. Regular bits.  – Numbered, so they follow in order. This is where I put the notes I use all the time. The information we ar...

  We often get asked to find out what your competitors are doing. Competitor analysis has always been essential when doing business planning, sales and marketing.  When researching your competitors, you need to start by knowing what you are looking for. What you are going to do with the information, and how it will help you.  It’s not stealing stuff from them. You don’t need to do anything suspicious to find their strengths and weaknesses. Or to isolate your competitive advantage. Only separating what makes your brand unique will reduce customer churn and growth. Yes, of course, we will find out more information than you. And use our analysis to provide you with an excellent picture. Why? Because it’s what we do most days. But with time and patience, you can do some yourself. So, if you want to find out what your competitors are doing, this article will help you think more strategically. What is Competitive Intelligence? Competitive intelligence is the finding, sorting an...