| name | competitive-analysis |
| description | Use when a rep needs a battlecard against a named competitor for a live deal or quarterly enablement. Maps competitor positioning, ICP, pricing, differentiators, weaknesses, win/loss patterns, and public review sentiment into a one-page battlecard. |
| safety | safe |
When to use
Trigger this skill when:
- A rep enters a deal where a specific competitor is incumbent or finalist (e.g. "they're also evaluating Gong").
- A CRO or PMM is refreshing the quarterly battlecard library.
- A new competitor enters the category and the field team needs positioning quickly.
- A deal is stalling and the rep suspects the competitor is winning on a specific angle.
Do not use this for market-level category analysis. This skill is adversarial and per-competitor. For a category landscape, use a market research tool.
Inputs
Required:
competitor_name — e.g. "Gong", "Outreach", "Clari".our_product_context — a sentence describing our product and category so the output contrasts meaningfully.
Optional:
deal_context — the specific deal this battlecard is for (vertical, size, persona). Tightens the output.known_objections — objections the rep has already heard in this deal.internal_win_loss_notes — paste from CRM or Gong.
Outputs
A single Markdown battlecard with these sections:
- Header — competitor name, category, one-sentence positioning in their words.
- Target ICP — who they sell to best.
- Pricing — public list prices if available, leaked/anecdotal if not, with source attribution.
- Strengths — 3-5 bullets where they genuinely outperform us.
- Weaknesses — 3-5 bullets, each backed by a review citation or public incident.
- Differentiators (ours vs. theirs) — side-by-side, no puffery.
- Objection handling — 3-5 common objections raised in deals against them, with recommended response patterns.
- Landmines — questions we can ask in discovery that expose their weakness.
- Win/loss patterns — when we tend to win, when we tend to lose.
- Proof points — case studies, G2 stats, security certs to cite.
See references/battlecard-template.md for the full template.
Tool dependencies
- WebSearch / WebFetch — required. Need to pull competitor website, pricing pages, G2 and Capterra reviews, and recent news.
- Salesforce or HubSpot MCP — optional; pulls win/loss notes on deals tagged with this competitor.
- Notion MCP — optional; read the existing battlecard archive if one exists.
Procedure
- Establish their positioning in their words. Pull the H1 from the competitor's homepage and their "About" / "Why us" copy. Do not paraphrase — the battlecard should tell us what they tell the market.
- Identify their ICP. Logos on their site, case studies, industries pages. Note both who they feature and who they don't. If every case study is >1000 employees, they don't sell to SMB even if their site says they do.
- Find pricing.
- Public pricing page: record list prices and tier structure.
- If gated: search for "[competitor] pricing" on Reddit, community forums, Glassdoor sales-rep reviews. Note source quality.
- Note contract terms: annual only? 3-year required? Auto-renew clauses?
- Scrape G2 and Capterra reviews. Pull the 10 most recent reviews and the 10 lowest-starred reviews. Extract common themes. Quantify: "4 of last 10 reviews mention slow support."
- Scan recent news. Layoffs, leadership departures, outages, lawsuits, acquisitions, funding — all affect the narrative.
- Identify 3-5 genuine strengths. Be honest. A battlecard that pretends the competitor has no strengths is worthless in a real deal.
- Identify 3-5 weaknesses with evidence. Each weakness needs a citation: review quote, incident report, missing feature page.
- Write objection handling. For each top objection ("they're cheaper", "they integrate with X", "they have more logos"), write a short response that acknowledges, reframes, and redirects. No dismissive responses.
- Build landmines. These are discovery questions the prospect can ask the competitor that will expose a weakness without us having to attack directly. Example: "What's your median time to first value?" lands differently depending on the competitor.
- Document win/loss patterns. When did we win? When did we lose? If no internal data is available, mark as "anecdotal."
Examples
Example 1 — Battlecard vs. Gong (for a conversation intelligence company)
Output excerpt:
Positioning (their words): "The Revenue Intelligence Platform."
Target ICP: Mid-market and enterprise B2B SaaS, 100+ reps. Most case studies feature companies >$100M ARR.
Pricing: No public list. Community reports $1,600/user/year floor for mid-market, three-year term standard. Source: Reddit r/sales thread, 2025-11-12.
Strengths:
- Brand recognition; often the default "safe" choice for a VP Sales.
- Robust call-recording infrastructure and transcript search.
- Large library of integrations, especially Salesforce.
Weaknesses:
- Implementation quoted at 8-12 weeks in 6 of 10 reviewed G2 reviews in Q1 2026.
- Weak coaching workflow; users report exporting to spreadsheets (G2, 2026-02-08).
- Three-year term is a common deal-breaker for PE-owned accounts with annual budget cycles.
Landmines:
- "What is your minimum contract term?"
- "Can we get a ramp-down clause if reps leave?"
- "What is the median implementation time for our segment?"
Example 2 — Battlecard vs. Notion (for a sales knowledge-base startup)
Output flags Notion's breadth as both strength and weakness: strength ("already in their stack"), weakness ("not purpose-built for sales content; permissions model breaks at scale"). Objection handling addresses "we already have Notion" with a reframe around revenue-weighted content freshness rather than features.
Constraints
- Every weakness must cite a source: a review, an incident, a missing page. No "we heard they're bad at X."
- Pricing must be tagged
public, leaked, or anecdotal. Never present anecdotal pricing as fact.
- Strengths section is non-optional. If you cannot find three, you have not researched enough.
- Objection responses must not contain "actually" or "that's not true." Reframe, do not contradict.
- Under 800 words total.
- Do not invent product features. If you do not know whether they have SSO, say so.
Quality checks
Before returning:
