How Big Data Can Drive Competitive Intelligence

Companies increasingly mine their own customer data for insights into the market. But what about data that tracks your competitors’ activities – in an ethical but profitable way ?

Oh, sure. Coca-Cola isn’t likely to just send Pepsico a terabyte of sales data for kicks. But what if Pepsi knew how often people buy Coke at the supermarket, and what else is likely to be in their shopping cart at the same time ?

It’s time for businesses to start a competitive intelligence process — while lowering the cost of analyzing information. In short, you need to continuously gather data online, from social media, website changes, news sources, and posted documents online, looking for clever bits of gold in the digital stream.

You’ll need to blend baseline of competitive intelligence (to prevent surprises in your own business) with proprietary data sets obtained on the market (to create surprises –you’re your rivals).