Competitive businesses currently have three levers to become profitable agents with a long-term vision. All three are intrinsically related to each other and form an important part of the services we offer our clients. In the same way that the digital transformation of a company cannot be understood without properly activating its Customer Experience, the latter will be lame if competitive intelligence in the market in which it operates is not properly addressed; and this, in turn and to close the circle, finds in digitization one of its constant vectors to increase the possibilities and the turnover.
Today we will focus our attention on the third of these items, competitive intelligence, and we will do so with the help of three infographics that detail what this discipline is, that give general guidelines on how to approach it and that will even give us a touch of history to understand that, although it is more in vogue than ever, it has its roots in time almost 500 years ago.
The first of these infographics was created by the Fuld consulting firm, and proposes a bold and disruptive approach to defining competitive intelligence by defining what it is "NOT". It is a way of suggesting that it is a discipline that is sometimes confused with some practices that are not always legitimate, and certainly not as effective. For example, it states that it is NOT "espionage", but a legitimate tactical and strategic research to identify threats and opportunities. And it is certainly NOT "a crystal ball", but a process of alert management to provide corporations with appropriate approaches to reality in both the short and long term.
What else is competitive intelligence NOT? Well, it is certainly NOT a "simple Google search", because it is about determining the competitive gaps that allow determining a strategy. And for those who think of prefabricated recipes, NO, it is not that either: it is presented in multiple formats, from the most structured to the most informal. And in any case it involves two-way teamwork, because it is NOT the work of a single intelligent person, and it is of NO use if it does not generate insights that will be listened to by anyone.
Trying to link competitive intelligence only to technology is also a mistake, because it is NOT the result of the acquisition of new technologies, but of a critical analysis driven by the top management of organizations so that the information obtained makes sense, and therefore it is NOT about the way in which each company sees itself in relation to the market: either you see yourself from the outside, or it is not intelligence. Moreover, it is NOT a job that can be reduced to spreadsheets, because it requires qualitative analysis, and it is certainly NOT a trend, hence the important historical nuance we mentioned above. It may be a trend, but it is not the result of the whim of anyone who has had a happy occurrence.
The second infographic comes from the University of Michigan and is entitled "Competitive intelligence step by step" and that is exactly what it aims to do: to summarize very briefly in just 9 steps what a company that really wants to get into this area should do. The process begins with a word loved and hated, hoped for and feared in equal parts by company managers: brainstorming. Although not for the pleasure of debating, but with clear objectives in mind: what words define the industry? Which companies can be taken as examples? Once this is clear, we can move on to the second step: analyzing the problem by separating what we want to address into as many pieces as necessary.
Third step: ask yourself "who cares" about your industry, so that you know where to find the right information, and then be able to research coherently in the most diverse industry databases, academic articles and open sources on the Internet. This research must also be completed with "hot contacts", from researchers, to experts, to association leaders: talk, talk, talk to get past the halfway point of this competitive intelligence process.
Then, or rather during all the previous steps, it is necessary to keep a good record of all the stages: who you have talked to, where you have taken data from, what were the sources of information, and that everything is well organized. Only then can we go to the seventh step, which is simply "look for more", a simple antidote to the early retirement syndrome. Is everything really looked for? It is time to compile and analyze, so that we can then establish the alert mechanisms that will allow us to know and identify all the new developments in our competitive environment.
The third and last infographic, and perhaps the most surprising, comes from another specialized company (Aqute). Throughout a timeline with milestones, it serves to situate the origin of competitive intelligence almost 500 years ago. Specifically in 1570, the year in which the Fugger family of bankers decided to launch their "newsletter" (in the format of the time) on the political and economic events in Europe that could most affect their clients' investments. It took a little over 300 years for the term "competitive intelligence" to appear in black and white, which occurred in 1876 at a civil engineering institute during a discussion on the design of carriages.
Between these two historic moments, memorable events took place, such as that of the Jesuit priest François d'Entrecolles, who in 1712 had the courage to distinguish himself as a "trusted foreigner" in the "secret city" of Chinese porcelain, Kin Techen. Once he achieved that status, he took the opportunity to collect information on manufacturing techniques and send them to Europe. Or the signing of the English industrialist John Holker by the French Trade Office in 1756, which was aimed at developing textile machinery and attracting the talent of English workers, as well as setting up an office of Economic Intelligence.
Two milestones in the modern era of competitive intelligence can be dated: 1986, when the Society of Competitive Intelligence Professionals was created; and 1996, when the United States passed legislation against espionage based on the activity of the Chinese population in that country. This is not without irony... 284 years after a religious man introduced in Europe the knowledge acquired in a "secret city" of the yellow giant.
Three infographics to understand what it is and what it is not, how it is defined and how it is developed, and where and why it has its roots, something that is trendy but not fashionable and that is vital for business development: competitive intelligence.
Photo by Giammarco Boscaro on Unsplash
