---
name: research-a-competitor
description: A sourced profile of one competitor: what they sell, who they win with, how they price, and where they are weak.
license: MIT
metadata:
  author: The Revenue AI Report
  version: 1.0.0
  last-reviewed: 2026-09-22
  source: https://www.therevenueaireport.com/skills/research-a-competitor
---

# Research a Competitor

A sourced profile of one competitor: what they sell, who they win with, how they price, and where they are weak.

## When to use this skill

- A competitor starts showing up in deals and nobody can describe them accurately.
- You are about to write positioning, a battlecard, or a pricing change.
- Your current competitor notes are older than two quarters.

## Inputs to collect

- The competitor's website, pricing page, and any public documentation
- Recent public material: funding news, job postings, release notes, review site pages
- Three deals you lost to them and what the buyer said

## Process

1. Collect public material first. Site, pricing page, docs, release notes, job postings, review site pages.
2. Add private evidence you already own: loss notes, buyer quotes, recordings summaries.
3. Paste it all. Ask for the profile with a source line per claim.
4. Delete every claim that has no source. Do not soften it, cut it.
5. Write one sentence on what would change your view, then set a review date.

## Decision rules

- No source, no claim. Pricing especially: use the published figure or say it is unpublished.
- A weakness only counts if a buyer said it or the material shows it. Internal opinion is a hypothesis.
- If the competitor appears in fewer than three of your deals, keep the profile short and revisit later.

## Output requirements

- A one-page profile: offer, buyer, pricing model, strengths, weaknesses, open questions.
- A source line for every claim.
- A review date and an owner.

## Quality checks

- Every number traces to a published page or an internal record.
- Inferences are labelled as inferences.
- The profile says what it does not know.

## Limitations

- Model training data about vendors goes stale fast. Verify anything a model produces from memory.
- Review sites skew to unhappy and incentivised reviewers. Treat them as signal, not measurement.
- Public pricing pages rarely match negotiated pricing.

## Example input

Pasted: competitor pricing page listing per seat tiers, twelve review site entries, notes from three lost deals where the buyer cited faster setup.

## Example output

Profile: per seat pricing published at two tiers, designed for teams under 200 people, strength is setup speed cited in all three losses, weakness is reporting depth named in seven reviews. Unknown: enterprise pricing, security posture. Review in 90 days.

## Review checklist

- Did someone check the pricing claims against the live page today?
- Is every weakness backed by a buyer statement or public material?
- Is the review date on a calendar with a name against it?

## Works with

- Playbook: Evidence first content operation (L6) (marketing, L6) https://www.therevenueaireport.com/playbooks/marketing-evidence-first-content-rebuild-l6
- Playbook: Orchestrated competitive response (L4) (enablement, L4) https://www.therevenueaireport.com/playbooks/enablement-competitive-response-orchestration-l4
- Playbook: Make conversation data do work (L3) (sales, L3) https://www.therevenueaireport.com/playbooks/conversation-data-to-work-l3
- Tool: scite.ai (Knowledge & Search) https://www.therevenueaireport.com/tools/scite-ai
- Tool: AnswerGrid Sheets (Knowledge & Search) https://www.therevenueaireport.com/tools/answergrid-sheets
- Tool: AlphaSense (Data & Analytics) https://www.therevenueaireport.com/tools/alphasense
- Tool: Consensus (Knowledge & Search) https://www.therevenueaireport.com/tools/consensus
- Tool: Semantic Scholar (Knowledge & Search) https://www.therevenueaireport.com/tools/semantic-scholar

## Rules of conduct

- Write for a Director, VP, or operator. Short sentences. Explain uncommon terms.
- Separate facts from assumptions. Never hide uncertainty.
- Do not invent numbers, benchmarks, quotes, or customer names.
- Do not send messages, change CRM records, or publish anything unless the user explicitly asks.
- Flag when a decision needs human review.

## Evidence

This skill is grounded in The Revenue AI Report research:
- https://www.therevenueaireport.com/research/what-works
- https://www.therevenueaireport.com/research/proof-gap





Source and updates: https://www.therevenueaireport.com/skills/research-a-competitor