competitor-discovery

Competitor Discovery

Usage

Use when you don't know who your competitors are, when entering a new market, or when refreshing the competitor list after a pivot or market shift.

Process

Step 1: Gather Inputs

Ask the user for:

1. Product description — what it does, what category it's in, key features
2. Target audience — who buys or uses the product (role, industry, company size)
3. Known competitors (optional) — names or URLs to include without searching
4. Number to find (optional) — default: 5-7

Step 2: Build Search Queries

Construct 4-6 search queries mixing these angles:

• Category: "[category] tools 2025 2026" or "[category] software"
• Alternative: "[product name] alternatives" or "tools like [product name]"
• Problem: "[primary use case] solution" or "[pain point] tool"
• Audience: "best [category] for [target company type]" or "[category] for [target role]"
• Comparison: "best [category] compared" or "top [category] platforms"
• Review sites: "[category] G2" or "[category] Capterra" (to mine company names from lists)

Tailor queries to the product type. A B2B SaaS product needs different queries than a marketplace or agency service.

Step 3: Search and Collect

Run web searches for each query. For each result:

• Extract company names and domains that appear across multiple results
• Pull companies listed on review/comparison sites (G2, Capterra, etc.) — these are strong signals
• Skip aggregator sites themselves, job boards, news articles about funding, and clearly unrelated results

Compile a candidate list of 8-12 companies. For each, note:

• Name
• URL (homepage)
• How found — which search queries surfaced them

Rank candidates by frequency — companies appearing in 3+ different searches are almost certainly direct competitors.

Step 4: Quick Profile Each Candidate

For each candidate, fetch their homepage (and pricing page if easily accessible) and extract:

• One-liner — what they say they do, in their own words
• Target audience signals — who the site speaks to
• Overlap — how directly they compete (direct / adjacent / tangential)

Classify each candidate:

• Direct competitor — same problem, same audience, similar solution
• Adjacent competitor — same audience but different approach, or same approach but different audience
• Tangential — some overlap but fundamentally different product

Drop tangential candidates unless the list would be too short (fewer than 3 direct competitors).

Step 5: Present for Confirmation

Present the ranked list to the user:

I found these competitors for [product name]:

Direct competitors:
1. [Name] — [one-liner] — [url]
2. [Name] — [one-liner] — [url]
3. [Name] — [one-liner] — [url]

Adjacent competitors:
4. [Name] — [one-liner] — [url]
5. [Name] — [one-liner] — [url]

Should I save these? Any to add or remove?

Wait for user confirmation. They may know competitors that web search missed, or flag false positives.

Output Format

# Competitor Discovery: [Product Name]

**Date:** [current date]
**Competitors found:** [X]

## Competitors

| # | Name | URL | Type | One-Liner |
|---|------|-----|------|-----------|
| 1 | [name] | [url] | Direct | [what they do] |
| 2 | [name] | [url] | Direct | [what they do] |
| 3 | [name] | [url] | Adjacent | [what they do] |

## Search Queries Used
- [query 1] — [X results]
- [query 2] — [X results]

## Recommended Next Steps
- Run competitor-site-analysis on top competitors for full profiles (pricing, moats, GTM signals)
- Run competitor-landscape after 2+ analyses for cross-competitor comparison and positioning map

Rules

• Never include a company without visiting their site — one-liners must come from their actual homepage.
• Never guess at pricing — only note what's publicly visible on the homepage or pricing page.
• Never include more than 7 competitors without user approval — keep the list focused.
• If web search returns fewer than 3 relevant competitors, the category may be too niche — try broader search terms.
• If the market appears very crowded (15+ candidates found), suggest focusing on direct competitors only.
• Re-run every 6 months or after significant product/market changes.