Anatomy of a Winning Business Competitor Analysis Report: A blog exploring the anatomy and structure of a good report.

 

The purpose of a competitor analysis report is to give readers ideas on business management solutions UAE through a comprehensive view of the business and its capabilities. A good report should tackle all key factors the decision makers are looking for – be it strategy, development, market standing or partners. This is why companies often consider this type of report as an industry standard piece of content to showcase their strengths. It is an invaluable resource to assist your search efforts.

If you don't know specifically how your competitors are operating, you'll never be able to fully replicate their success. However, competitors' analysis reports can sometimes be intimidating and difficult to decipher, which results in people frequently missing out on the wealth of information that's already been provided for them.

Competitor Analysis

A competitive analysis is an important part of a company's marketing plan. With this evaluation, a business can determine how it compares with the competition in terms of product offerings, target markets, marketing techniques and strategies and more. It provides valuable insight for companies trying to gain market share by identifying the strengths and weaknesses of their competitors.

The most effective way to conduct a competitor analysis is by utilizing a competitor analysis report format, which is an organized and structured way to present findings.

In this blog post, we're going to explore the anatomy of a winning business competitor analysis report:

The Executive Summary

The executive summary is a critical component of your business plan because it summarizes the essential elements of your plan. It is typically a one page section that concisely states the problem you are addressing, what opportunity exists for your company, and how you plan to solve the problem and capture market share. In addition, it is important to include key metrics and assumptions that demonstrate the viability of your plan as well as funding requested.

It should include:

●       A description of your company and its products/services

●       An overview of your company's history, mission statement, and current position in the market.

●       A description of the competition you analyzed, including data about their market share and position in the market

●       A description of your methodology and how you collected data on your competitors

●       Your findings: Who are your direct competitors? What are they doing better than you? What are they doing worse? How can you capitalize on their weaknesses and improve on their strengths as a means of gaining market share?

This summary should answer questions like:

-What are our competitors up to?

-What are our customers doing on their sites (and how do we compare)?

-Where do we stand when it comes to all this information?

The Introduction

The introduction section of a competitor analysis report provides background information on the purpose, objectives, methodology, timeframe, and limitations of the research. It also identifies competitors by name and gives an overview of their business models and market positions.

Market Overview

In this section, you need to give a broad overview of your market.  This will provide the context for your analysis. Business planners creating a competition analysis report use this section to try to answer the following questions in this section:

1. What is the total size of the market category you are planning to enter?
2. How much of that market is currently served by your competitors?
3. Why is that portion being served?
4. What percentage of that market do you plan to capture?
5. How much does each segment of customers spend on average in your category?

The size of your competition can also determine the amount of money you need for start-up costs and operating capital. If a large company already dominates the market, it may be difficult for small businesses to find a place in that industry. However, if there are many small players in an industry, you may be able to take advantage of some opportunities they have overlooked — especially if a large part of the market remains unserved.

Competitive Landscape

Top business consultants in Dubai advise that the competitive landscape section of your competitor analysis report to give your readers a comprehensive overview of the competitive environment in which your company operates. This section will help you to discover what competitive strategies other companies are using, so that you can make informed decisions about how to position your business.

To create a competitive landscape section, you first need to determine what factors to include in it. Consider the following questions:

Which types of competitors should be included? For example, some companies choose only to compare themselves directly with their main competitors, while others also consider indirect competitors.

Which geographical area is relevant? Some businesses look at their entire industry, while others focus on smaller areas such as cities or regions.

What time period do you want to examine? Some companies analyze the current state of their industry and make predictions for the future, while others look at more historical data.

For each competitor, we include information on size, market share, relative strength (based on factors such as brand recognition, product quality and customer service), and annual revenue.

Current Trends

This section of the report will outline current trends in your industry and market. These are two distinct but related concepts, so make sure to differentiate between the two.

It answers the following questions:

What is currently happening in your industry? (Industry trends)

What is currently happening in the market? (Market trends)

Definitions

Industry - a group of companies that produce similar products or services for a particular market or for consumers in general. Examples: healthcare, manufacturing, and energy.

Market - a specific segment of the economy, usually defined by geography, demographics, and/or purchasing behaviors. Example: fast-food restaurants in Abu Dhabi and Dubai.

Gap in the market

This is an incredibly important section of your competitor analysis, and one that will require a lot of research. If market research companies in Dubai can identify a gap in the market that other competitors are missing, then you’ve found a place to insert your product or service.

Perhaps there are no competitors offering a product for a specific audience. Maybe the layout of your competitor’s website has room for improvement. Perhaps they don’t offer online chat support or guarantee their products. This is where you identify how you can fill the void in the market and make your company stand out from everyone else.

Whether you innovate with new technology or use your own unique skill set to give customers exactly what they want, use this section of your report to highlight how you will win them over and take them away from other companies competing with you. This section may include brand recognition, marketing presence, product offering, service offering and use of cases.

Strategic Audit/SWOT Analysis

The strategic audit section of the business competitor analysis report is a more detailed version of the executive summary. The purpose of this section is to provide further detail and analysis on the company's strategic positioning, along with its strengths and weaknesses in relation to its competitors.

In this section, there should be a discussion on the company's overall mission statement and whether or not it is aligned with its specific business objectives. It's important for a company to have this sense of direction so that all employees are working toward the same goals.

This section should also contain a detailed discussion on the company's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT). The SWOT should identify key areas where the company excels, as well as any areas where it might be lacking.

SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. Each category is explained below:

Strengths: What does your business do well? What unique resources can you draw upon that your competitors can't? What does your market audience and segment see as your strengths?

Weaknesses: What could you improve? Where does your business fall short when compared to others? Are there resources you don't have access to that other companies/businesses do?

Opportunities: What and where are there right opportunities facing you and your business? Is changing technology creating new markets? Are other businesses failing to provide products or services that customers want? Can changes in the economy open up doors for you?

Threats: What obstacles do you face? Is changing technology threatening your position? Are you debt-ridden or have cash-flow problems? Could any of your weaknesses seriously be a threat to your business, now and in the future?

Comparing Your Brand to Competitors

The goal of any competitor analysis is to maximize your brand’s strengths and minimize its weaknesses. In order to achieve this, you need to have a clear picture of who your competitors are and what strategies they’re using to succeed. This will help you understand what areas you need to focus on if you want to take market share away from them.

To get this information, you should start by comparing your brand against three key areas: products and services, policies, and marketing efforts. Once you have this information, you can use it to analyze each competitor individually.

Conclusion/Recommendations/Calls to Action

The conclusion section is the last part of the report where you summarize everything you have done or presented in the report. In this section, you also make recommendations to address any issues that were identified during the analysis.

Here are some key points to help you write an effective conclusion:

●       Include a summary of the main points raised in the body of your report. Avoid repeating everything that was included in the preceding sections as this could bore your readers.

●       Make recommendations on how best to deal with any challenges or issues discovered during the analysis. These may include strategies to improve products, change marketing campaigns, expand into new markets and so on.

●       Include a call to action that tells your readers what they should do next. This could be “we recommend hiring more staff at our Al Ain, UAE workshop to handle increased demand” or “investing in a new online software system to shorten order fulfillment time” or “expanding our customer service department” etc.

Concluding your analysis report by highlighting next steps is crucial because it lets people know what needs to be done.

A good competitor report presents the facts in easy-to-digest formats, and supports their claims by providing evidence from reliable sources. Report elements such as an executive summary and a company profile will help the reader understand the purpose of your report, and why you chose to target that particular company for your analysis. The reports should be straightforward, self-explanatory documents which are visually appealing and easy to follow. Follow these tips from Volonte business transformation experts UAE to create a winning competitor analysis and reap the benefits of this useful research tool.