Competitor Analysis Template
A competitor analysis template is a fixed set of questions you answer about a rival — their positioning, pricing, product, marketing, and where they're exposed — so you end up with a decision document instead of a pile of screenshots and open tabs. The point isn't the document. It's forcing yourself to write down specific answers instead of vague impressions: "their pricing seems complicated" isn't useful; "3 tiers, no public Enterprise price, annual-only discount" is.
How to use it: pick one competitor and block 45–60 minutes. Go section by section — don't skip "Weaknesses" or "Opportunities" just because they're harder than "Product & features." Those two sections are where the template earns its keep: they're the difference between an analysis and a move you can act on. When you're done, "Recommended actions" should read like a short to-do list, not a summary.
The template
Copy each section into your doc and fill in the prompt. Work top to bottom.
- 01
Competitor overview
Name, URL, founding year, funding/size if known, and a one-sentence description of what they do.
- 02
Positioning & messaging
Their homepage headline claim, the category they say they're in, and the one thing they want a visitor to believe in five seconds.
- 03
Target customer
Who their site and pricing are clearly written for — company size, role, industry — and who they're visibly not targeting.
- 04
Pricing & packaging
Tiers, prices (or "not public"), what's gated behind each tier, and the billing model (monthly/annual, seat- or usage-based).
- 05
Product & features
The 3–5 features they lead with, plus what they list that you don't have and vice versa.
- 06
Strengths
Where they're genuinely ahead — brand, distribution, feature depth, price, integrations. Be honest; this section is worthless if you undersell them.
- 07
Weaknesses
Where they fall short — product gaps, confusing pricing, weak support reputation, slow releases. Look at review sites and forums, not just their own site.
- 08
Marketing & channels
Where they show up — SEO, paid ads, YouTube, LinkedIn, communities, partnerships — and any channel they've clearly abandoned.
- 09
Opportunities (your wedge)
Given their weaknesses and your strengths, the specific angle you can take that they can't easily copy. One sentence.
- 10
Threats
What they could do next that would hurt you — a price cut, a feature you rely on, an acquisition, a new channel.
- 11
Recommended actions
3–5 concrete next steps, each with an owner and a rough timeframe. Not "improve messaging" — "rewrite the pricing page to show annual savings, [owner], this week."
Filled example
A concrete pass using Northstar Metrics (fictional) — a made-up competitor, so nothing here is a real product claim.
- Competitor overview
- Northstar Metrics, northstarmetrics.io, founded 2021, ~40 employees, self-serve analytics dashboard for e-commerce brands.
- Positioning & messaging
- Headline: "See every dollar of your ad spend, in real time." Category: marketing analytics. The 5-second belief: "we unify your ad platforms into one dashboard."
- Target customer
- DTC e-commerce brands, $1M–$20M revenue; marketing manager or founder as buyer. Not agencies or enterprise (no multi-client view, no SSO).
- Pricing & packaging
- Starter $79/mo (1 ad account), Growth $199/mo (5 accounts), Enterprise "contact us." Monthly or annual (2 months free). No usage add-ons.
- Product & features
- Leads with real-time dashboards, ad-spend attribution, Slack alerts. No cohort/LTV analysis and no public API — both of which we ship.
- Strengths
- Clean onboarding (under 10 minutes to first dashboard), strong Shopify integration, active in DTC Slack communities.
- Weaknesses
- No agency/multi-client support, single-touch attribution only (complaints on review sites), no public API — repeatedly requested in their own forum.
- Marketing & channels
- Heavy SEO content and a moderately active YouTube channel. Almost no paid social; LinkedIn posting stopped ~6 months ago.
- Opportunities (your wedge)
- Position as "the one with an API and multi-touch attribution" for the agencies they've priced out and the attribution depth they've left open.
- Threats
- If they ship a public API or an agency tier, the wedge narrows fast — worth watching their changelog and job postings.
- Recommended actions
- 1) Publish a "Northstar Metrics alternative" page (content, this week). 2) Add an Agencies pricing tier (product marketing, 2 weeks). 3) Set a recurring changelog/careers check for API or agency signals (ongoing).
FAQ
- What's the difference between a competitor analysis and a battlecard?
- A competitor analysis is the research document — broad, covering positioning, product, pricing, and market context. A battlecard is the distilled output for sales reps in a live deal — shorter and action-oriented, built around objections and talk tracks.
- How often should I redo a competitor analysis?
- Revisit it whenever a competitor changes pricing, ships a major feature, or you win or lose a deal citing them by name. As a baseline, a quarterly refresh keeps it from going stale.
- How many competitors should I track with this template?
- Start with your top 2–3 — the ones that show up most in deals or search results. Three deep analyses beat ten shallow ones.
- Where do I find the information to fill this in?
- Their own site (pricing, homepage, changelog), review sites (G2, Capterra), their job postings (a signal of what they're building next), and your own sales and support teams.
- What if a section is hard to fill in, like Weaknesses?
- That's a sign to look outside their marketing — reviews, forums, support complaints, and your own lost-deal reasons. If you truly can't find anything, mark it "unknown" rather than guessing.
Dozier fills this in from a cited Sweep.
This template is close to what Dozier already outputs — the difference is it isn’t hand-filled. A Sweep runs against a named competitor and every claim in the resulting Dossier is a cited finding traced to a specific source — not an assumption. The strengths, weaknesses, and “why we win/lose” sections map to those findings; the recommended actions map to Moves — ranked and priced against your own numbers. And Radar keeps it current so you’re not re-filling it every quarter.
New to this? Read the Competitive Intelligence Playbook for the full framework behind this template.