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Competitor Analysis: How to spy on your rival’s social media pages

Competitor Analysis
Metigy Learning
Gathering data is crucial for staying competitive, especially when it comes to staying current on pivotal industry trends. Most social media platforms offer analytics for business owners and marketing managers to analyze their content, which is similar to the Metigy Content Publishing Toolkit Rather than relying on your performance over time, you need to gain a competitive advantage by leveraging competitor data and comparing it to your own.  A competitive analysis is a strategy involving identifying your direct competitors and gathering research on their sales, products, and marketing strategies. Conducting competitive research helps you to identify your product’s unique value proposition, which is what makes your product or service different from your competitor’s. 

4 ways to use competitive insights to beat your competition

ways to use competitive insights to beat your competition

Gathering and update industry competitive data allows you to create benchmarks and business goals that inform your marketing strategy. Building a competitor analysis is a business strategy that can increase your market share by helping you learn from your competitors.  But how do you find your competitor’s data, and what can you do with it to make your marketing campaigns stand out?  Let’s take a look at four steps you can take to build a competitive analysis to enhance your marketing plan design and content strategy. 

1. Pinpoint your competition

Pinpoint your competition

Before you can conduct your analysis, you need to take a look at the competitive landscape. Make a list of competitors who are actively marking a product or service similar to yours.  Chances are, you already know who your direct competitors are. But to build a thorough competitor analysis, you need to add your indirect competitors to the list as well.  Look for competitors in your industry who use social media as a significant cornerstone in their marketing strategy. These are the brands that will offer you the most learning opportunities and benchmark data.  The best way to identify your competition is to use a search engine like Google. Search for the SEO keywords that consumers would use to find your business. Keep it simple and try different variations. Also, take a look at the social media platforms you are using to promote your business. Search with your SEO keywords on each outlet to find companies and start-ups with a similar product or content marketing strategy to your own.  As you find the names of your competitors, add them to a spreadsheet. There are competitive analysis templates out there to help make data sharing easy. However, this process is incredibly time-consuming, but being thorough will help you gain better information. 

2. Gather data for a competitor SWOT analysis  

Gather data for a competitor SWOT analysis 

Once you’ve compiled a comprehensive list of your competitors, you will go back and gather data for a SWOT analysis. This method targets your competitor’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats to your marketing strategy.  To gather the correct data, focus on these critical elements: 
  • The website and user experience: Analyze your competitor’s website’s language, graphics, and overall user experience. Compare it to your own to see how you can improve. 
  • Pricing: Learn what your target market is willing to pay by seeing your competitor’s products are priced. This will help inform your own pricing strategy when determining the cost of a new product. 
  • Competitor’s customer reviews: Check out what your target audience is saying about your competitor. This will give you insight into your competitor’s strengths and weaknesses. 
  • Shipping costs: Identify how your competition handles shipping. Because shipping costs are the #1 reason for cart abandonment, see if you can offer competitive pricing on shipping costs. Not quite there in your budget? Think about other ways to gain an edge. 
Another way to gather competitor information is to interact with them directly. Behave as potential customers would: sign up for their newsletter, follow them on social media, and place a product in your cart on their website without checking out.  Observe their behavior, the language they use, and how it captures the target market’s attention. The more data you gather, the better the overall picture you have about what makes your competitor successful and what product features can set you apart. 

3. Analyze your competitor’s social media presence 

Analyze your competitor’s social media presence 

Social media is essential for outshining your competition. It’s a great way to gain brand exposure and entice new customers to make a purchase.  Turn your attention to your competitor’s social media accounts, namely on large platforms like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter. See how many followers your competition has and how active they are.  Don’t forget to engage with alternative social channels as well. While the digital market is hot, offline touchpoints also serve as a great way to engage target audiences. If your competitor is hosting an in-person event, be sure to attend and gather competitive intelligence to use in your analysis.  This will help you track market trends and better understand how customers feel about the competitor’s product. This information will guide your own business choices and act as a starting point for making your product more attractive. 

4. Use the data wisely 

Use the data wisely 

Now that you have collected vital information about your competitors, it’s time to perform a SWOT analysis on your brand.  Compare your competitor’s data with your own. Put your competitor’s content side-by-side with your’s to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities for growth, and threats to your market share. See how often they post and how many interactions these posts attract.  It’s essential to remember that social media competitive analysis isn’t done for marketers to copy the competition. The purpose is to guide you towards your unique solutions. Use the data you collect to find what works and see how you can apply that strategy to your brand.  Competitive analysis may show you that you’ve been targeting the wrong social networks or not effectively communicating your message to the target audience. 

Enhance your competitive analysis with analysis tools

Enhance your competitive analysis with analysis tools

Performing a regular competitive analysis doesn’t mean you need to spend all your time keeping an eye on every move your competitor makes. Keep tabs on how their businesses are changing, and watch out for new competitors in your industry.  To keep your business one step ahead of the competition, a competitive analysis will be a critical factor in creating new business strategies to dominate your market. To stay ahead of the pack, you need innovative, AI-driven tools that will help you save time and money.  Using a spreadsheet is helpful when tracking competitor data, but if you are short on time, use social analytics to automate the data collection process.  Metigy’s ultimate marketing tools go beyond gathering competitors’ data. They offer opportunities to set objectives, create collaborative to-do lists, and provide key insights that least to recommendations to improve your company’s marketing strategy.  Partner with Metigy today to make your marketing easy and effective.  [/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column] [/et_pb_row] [/et_pb_section]
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