Fortifying Your Competitive Position
Mid-2025 brings heightened challenges for technology leaders. Market turbulence, social tensions, and widespread uncertainty are reshaping business priorities just as companies conduct their mid-year reviews. The technology sector faces unprecedented competitive pressure due to AI, forcing boards, CEOs, and executive leadership teams to reexamine their market positioning and go-to-market (GTM) approaches to meet both annual targets and second-half objectives.
Understanding your full competitive landscape is essential for strategic success. This means identifying not just established rivals but also emerging players and potential future threats that could disrupt your market position.
Effective competitive intelligence requires a systematic approach that goes far beyond tracking obvious rivals in an Excel spreadsheet or Google Sheet. Success demands precise market definition, comprehensive competitor monitoring across multiple dimensions, data-driven customer profiling, and strategic forecasting of how your competitive landscape will evolve.
As you will see in the following framework, this requires both strategic thinking and tactical execution across six key areas.
Ensure your market is clearly defined—sector, segment, not just a vague "space." A precise definition strengthens competitive strategy, while vague positioning weakens it and confuses customers. Don’t conflate this with your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP), which is a separate focus. (See #4 below.)
Track not just direct competitors, but also new entrants and adjacent-market threats that may quietly expand into your space. Use tools like ChatGPT, Crunchbase, Google News, and private databases to map the landscape and surface overlooked players. Combining AI with manual research reveals emerging risks early.
Monitor competitor talent and HR signals via LinkedIn, job boards, and review sites. Track hiring trends, leadership changes, and new roles in product, sales, and engineering to spot strategic moves. Use Glassdoor to uncover internal issues and operational gaps you can exploit.
Ensure your ICP is grounded in real marketing and sales data—metrics like conversion rates, deal velocity, retention and more KPIs. Once defined, go beyond job titles and firmographics by considering buying signals and behaviors that consistently drive sales and ARR growth.
Forecast how your market’s competitive landscape may evolve. Go beyond analyzing current rivals—consider potential entrants such as strategic tech firms, large service providers, and the growing influence of AI. Use competitor patent filings and IP data to identify emerging innovations and anticipate future threats.
Identify the key partners in your market ecosystem to shape a strategy that both supports your growth and disrupts competitors. Define clear targets for the percentage of revenue generated through direct versus partner-driven (indirect) sales. Strengthen this strategy by aligning it with your M&A plans—or by closely tracking how competitors use acquisitions to expand their reach.
It’s also advisable to assign ongoing ownership of this discipline to ensure consistency and accountability—ideally to a founder in the early stages, or to a product or marketing manager in later-stage companies—to ensure consistent updates are delivered to the ELT and board.
The Time to Act is Now
Competitive intelligence is an ongoing discipline, not a one-time task. The six-step framework outlined in this post only delivers results with consistent analysis, monitoring, and strategic action. Your mid-year review is an ideal time to reassess your market position, spot new threats, and adjust your strategy. Companies that invest in this work now will be best positioned to seize opportunities and stay ahead as 2025 unfolds. Don’t wait—your competitors won’t.
Please share this post with a friend who's currently facing competition, expects to encounter new challengers, or could benefit from this framework ahead of their mid-year review.