{"id":15274,"date":"2021-07-19T16:00:37","date_gmt":"2021-07-19T15:00:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.smartinsights.com\/?p=15274"},"modified":"2021-07-20T16:08:54","modified_gmt":"2021-07-20T15:08:54","slug":"online-competitor-benchmarking-tools","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.smartinsights.com\/marketplace-analysis\/competitor-analysis\/online-competitor-benchmarking-tools\/","title":{"rendered":"Competitor benchmarking with the RACE Framework"},"content":{"rendered":"

Use the RACE Framework to review and improve all aspects of your competitor benchmarking<\/h2>\n

When I train or give talks to marketers on digital marketing, I see that competitor benchmarking tools are popular. Often people will reach for their pens when I mention a tool to help inform their marketing. New, free tools are naturally the most popular!<\/p>\n

I thought it would be useful to break down and categorize the most important aspects of online benchmarking, so you can check out tools you could use to support each stage.<\/p>\n

Today, there is a great breadth and depth of paid and free benchmarking tools available for marketers. Sometimes it can be difficult to know where to start.<\/p>\n

That's why our competitor benchmarking guide and template includes a full list of free and premium online benchmarking tools integrated across the RACE Framework.<\/p>\n

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\n \n Competitor benchmarking guide and template\n <\/a>\n <\/div>\n
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Download our Business Resource \u2013 Competitor benchmarking guide and template<\/strong><\/p>\n

Whether in sport or business, you have to know how you rate compared with your peers, to know where you need to improve relative to them. If you want to be 'best-in-breed' in digital marketing or just to 'do better' you need a baseline to review the marketing effectiveness of competitors.<\/p>\n

Access the Competitor benchmarking guide and template<\/a><\/p>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n

What is competitor benchmarking?<\/h3>\n

Competitor benchmarking is a structured analysis comparing the online services, capabilities, performance, and tactics of an organization with competitors in the areas of customer acquisition, conversion, retention, and growth.<\/p>\n

A key part of market research, benchmarking is the optimum starting place for strategic decision-making. In the competitor research and benchmarking process, all key factors that affect the commercial performance of a company are identified. Performance is then reviewed against competitors for qualitative assessments and quantitative key performance indicators (KPIs) where relevant.<\/p>\n

Quantitative benchmarking criteria give you hard figures so you can compare your performance against that of competitors and seek to make improvements against. The RACE Framework provides a handy way of reviewing performance across your omnichannel marketing funnel which you can see below.<\/p>\n

\"Omnichannel<\/a><\/p>\n

Competitor benchmarking to inform your marketing strategy<\/h3>\n

The mind map diagram<\/a> below shows how I see the many different types of benchmarking activities that can be helpful for informing your marketing strategy, plus where they sit within our RACE Framework.<\/p>\n

The RACE Framework structure is a great template for elevating your approach to benchmarking to help you track and adapt your marketing at the key points in your customers' lifecycles. For example, using heat mapping tools to measure website traffic interaction, and customer feedback tools to measure customer engagement.<\/p>\n

Our competitor benchmarking guide and template<\/a> walks you through the next step - selecting the best (free\/premium) competitor research and benchmarking tools to gather the qualitative or quantitative research you need to inform your strategy.<\/p>\n

\"competitor<\/a><\/p>\n

Competitor benchmarking across the RACE Framework<\/h3>\n

Here are the activities, categorized by RACE, which make up a typical competitor benchmarking review:<\/p>\n

Plan<\/span><\/h4>\n