“An organization’s ability to learn, and to translate that learning into action rapidly, is the ultimate competitive advantage.”~ Jack Welch

You may never have had experience with business and competitive intelligence. Most small and mid-sized companies either do not have the resources for an internal competitive intelligence department, or they farm out those needs to a third party. Regardless, they certainly do not readily advertise they are gathering actionable intelligence on competitors. Thee process of gathering competitive intelligence is not as James Bond as it sounds. Professionals in this space sift through mountains of open-source data to predict the movements of competitors. Most competitive intelligence deals with strategic competitive trends, but you can take advantage of some of the same open-source data that drives the larger predictive competitive models.

On any level, social media is a boon for intelligence gathering. Follow your competition on all the major social media platforms. If you are familiar with a competitor’s movers and shakers, follow their professional and personal social media feeds if they are publicly accessible. By paying close attention, and sometimes reading between the lines, you can infer quite a bit. For example, if a competitor’s main social media feeds are talking about making a big announcement soon and the head of their real-estate department is grousing about working late, your competition might be making a big move. If your competition is dealing to end users, social listening might help you gauge the overall satisfaction of their customer base.

The drawback to performing your own competitive intelligence is that it can be time-consuming, depending on how far down the rabbit hole you wish to take it. If you sneak a peek at your own social media during the day or at lunch, replace that with checking out the competition. Any of this information that is publicly accessible can give you an advantage and assist you in making better decisions about your own business.

Consider this …

1. What open sources of competitive intelligence data do you have or can you get access to?

2. In what ways can you consistently gather “competitive intelligence” in your market?

3. What kind of process can you establish to enable you to keep a finger on the pulse of your industry, market, and/or competitors?

For more, check out The Top Performer’s Field Guide, The Innovator’s Field Guide, or visit www.JeffStandridge.com.

(Originally published in The Top Performer’s Field Guide.)