Competitive Intelligence
Analyze rivals to identify market gaps and define your differentiation
1 step
Mapping the Multi-Layered Competitive Landscape
Identify and categorize every player addressing your target pain point, including direct rivals and manual workarounds.
The most dangerous sentence a founder can utter in a boardroom is "We have no competition." As Gigi Wang emphasizes, venture capitalists are "Crunchbase experts" who see dozens of startups in every industry. If you claim a lack of competition, you aren't proving uniqueness; you are proving a lack of market research. To build a professional competitive map, you must stop looking for products that look like yours and start looking for anyone who addresses the same Customer Pain. You must ask the fundamental question from the Market Checklist: "How do they handle the pain today?" Often, your biggest competitor is not another startup, but a "manual workaround" like an Excel spreadsheet or a legacy process.
You must organize your research into a competitive pyramid consisting of three layers: Direct, Indirect, and Peripheral.
Direct Competitors: These are players who offer a similar product to the same audience (e.g., Gigwalk vs. Field Agent). They compete for the same "MSS" (Market Share). You must identify their "Secret Sauce" and their "Defensibility" (patents, high switching costs, or integration partnerships).
Indirect Competitors: These are companies that solve the same problem using a different technology or business model (e.g., Foursquare vs. Yelp for discovery). They don't look like you, but they capture the same customer budget.
Peripheral Competitors: These are players who solve a related problem but could easily expand into your space (e.g., TaskRabbit or Zaarly).
Your task is to identify the "Inability of Incumbents" to satisfy the current need. Why is the pain still there? Is it because the current solutions are too complex, too expensive, or lack a specific "Niche" feature? You must document the barriers to entry, such as defendable IP or exclusive distribution channels, that your competitors have built. By mapping the landscape this way, you turn your "Competition Slide" from a list of logos into a strategic argument for why the market is "ready for disruption." You are searching for the "Gaps in the Armor"—the specific segments or use cases that incumbents are too slow or too "Dinosaur-like" to protect.
2 step
Selecting Your Market Type Strategy (Steve Blank Logic)
Categorize your market as Existing, Resegmented, or New to determine your basis of competition and risk profile.
According to the methodology of Steve Blank, your market type determines your entire business strategy. You cannot differentiate yourself effectively until you know which game you are playing. Differentiating in an Existing Market is a "Better/Faster" game. Your customers are already using a solution, and they can clearly tell you the basis of competition. To win here, you must provide a 2x or 10x improvement in performance. The risk is that incumbents are well-funded and will fight to keep their "MSS." Your "Main Message" must focus on a specific, quantifiable benefit that makes switching an obvious choice.
The second option is the Resegmented Market, which is divided into Low-End or Niche strategies. In a Low-End resegmentation, you provide a product that is "good enough" for customers who are over-served and over-paying for current solutions. You win on cost and simplicity. In a Niche resegmentation, you extend an existing market with a "Special Feature" that no one else has yet (as seen in the "3. Define market positioning" slide). For example, if you are entering a niche, your users may have used similar products before, but your one unique feature is so critical that they will switch. This feature must be executed perfectly, even if the rest of your product is just "good enough" for the initial scale.
The third and most difficult path is the New Market. Here, your customers say "huh?"—they simply do not understand the category. You have zero market share on Day 1 because you are solving a problem people didn't know they could solve. Your differentiation is not "better performance," but "Simplicity and Convenience" where none existed. The risk here is not incumbents, but Market Adoption. You must "Evangelize the Vision" and inspire a community of "Doers and Dreamers." Your strategy must align with this reality: in an Existing Market, you spend on sales to take share; in a New Market, you spend on education to create a category.
3 step
Aligning Product Type and Sales Complexity
Analyze your "Product Type" based on Arseny Tarasov’s framework to ensure your sales system matches the customer's decision logic.
Differentiating your product is not just about the "What" (features); it is about the "How" (the sales and delivery process). Using the framework developed by Arseny Tarasov, you must categorize your product into one of three complexity tiers. This ensures that your "Action Driver" and "Sales System" are aligned with how your specific target audience buys.
Type 1 (The Commodity/Simple Tool): Examples include food or basic consumer software. The customer needs only one, and the need is clear. Your differentiation here is Price and Convenience. The decision-maker is a single individual, and the purchase cycle is "Instant." To win, you don't need a sales team; you need to "properly advertise" and offer a "Try & Buy" or "Demo" of the product itself.
Type 2 (The Professional Solution): Examples include mobile phones or luxury items. The customer has several needs, and they are buying a "Product + Advantages." Here, Features tell, but Benefits sell. You must differentiate based on "Price, Quality, Uniqueness, and Service." Personal or phone contact with a seller is vital, and the "Action Driver" is the perceived advantage over the status quo.
Type 3 (The Enterprise/Turnkey System): Examples include airplanes, specialized machinery, or enterprise software (ERP). The needs are many and require deep "Discovery." You are not selling a product; you are selling a Perceived Value and a Solution. The decision-maker is a group or a company, and the cycle is "Long." Your differentiation is "Turnkey delivery" and a "Promise of Improvement." You must track the customer's satisfaction with the result, not just the tool.
If you are building a Type 3 product but using a Type 1 sales strategy (just ads), your differentiation will fail because the customer won't trust you to solve their "Acute Pain." Conversely, if you have a Type 1 product but a complex Type 3 sales process, your "Costs" will kill your business. You must choose your "Product Type" and build your "Differentiation Statement" around the specific driver (Features, Benefits, or Solutions) that your audience values. This alignment is what Gigi Wang calls "Getting the Fundamentals Across"—helping the investor "get inside your business" by showing that you understand the economics of your specific value chain.
4 step
Constructing the Defensible "Secret Sauce" Statement
Synthesize your market research into a 2-minute narrative and a visual "USP" that triggers investor FOMO.
The final step is transforming your intelligence into a high-conversion narrative. As established in the "Perfecting Your Pitching" guidelines, you must move from the "What" and "Who" to the "Why Invest in Us?" This requires a "Differentiation Statement" that is both "Consistent and Credible." You must clearly articulate your value proposition to different stakeholders using quantifiable evidence. Your goal is to make the audience "Fall in love" with your company by showing them a future where the current "Pain" is erased by your "Secret Sauce."
Your Secret Sauce (or Proprietary Tech) is the core of your defensibility. You must describe the "Barriers to Entry" that will prevent "Potential Entrants" from copying your success. This is where you bring in the data from your "Market Sizing" and "Momentum" blocks. For example, if you have "3 non-pending technology patents" or an "AI-based auto-sorting" mechanism, this is the time to show it. Use visuals, charts, and videos—not just text—to make it real. As the materials suggest, a "Bonus Point" is awarded for SHOWING the product in action, through screenshots or tutorials, to prove that your solution address the market problem better than anyone else.
You must be able to explain your "Value Chain Economics." How will you make money, and more importantly, how will your customers make money? What is "in it for them"? By presenting a "Desired Outcome" and a "Size of the Prize" (your expected market share), you prove that you aren't just building a feature—you are building a "Turnkey Solution" for a big market. This final step aligns your "Strategic Classification" (Value vs. Volume) with your "Financials" to provide a credible forecast of major revenues and costs. You end the unit by creating a "Why Now?" slide, explaining the specific timing (regulatory shifts, tech convergence, or cultural trends) that makes your differentiation particularly powerful today. You are now ready to close the pitch by stating exactly what you want the audience to do next.
Expected Results
Lift Market Penetration by 10% and % of Organic Traffic by 20% by positioning your unique value against identified gaps in the competition.
Deliverables
A visual matrix placing you against Direct and Indirect rivals.
A formal designation of your Existing, New, or Niche approach.
A clear USP: "Unlike [Competitor], we [Unique Value] for [Segment]."