How do you create competitive intel that is really beneficial to sales (i.e. they actually read and use it)?

I’ve had the best success with easy to digest “competitive battlecards” for sales. The simpler, the better. They should give basic company info, pricing, and how to handl...

This is a little meta, but the best advice I have is to treat your sellers as your customers. What would you do to try to understand how to get a customer to use your pr...

Competitive Battlecards are the best asset for sales but remember to KISS (keep it stupid simple). Sales are often pressed for time so how can you clearly pick apart your...

This is a fun one. An aphorism we could coin here is that "Competitive battlecards are just like datasheets. Every salesperson desperately wants a new one, but nobody eve...

Great question and one that really hits home for me since I used to do competitive intel while sitting in the sales organization at Medallia. The best approach I've seen ...

This is a great question and one that generally takes refinement over time based on feedback from sales. Here's what you can do to make sure your competitive intel is be...

As with any other sales content, find out how your specific sales team likes to consume content. This will give you an idea of the format, as well as the channels in whic...

Make it snackable. Make it easy to remember. Make it impactful. Show the impact of reps applying this to amplify awareness and usage. Reps spend their days diving into a ...

When gathering competitive intel, I find the most important thing is to have the goal for it clearly mapped out. Why does Sales (or product) want the competitive intel? W...

Love this question, because if sales doesn’t use your competitive intel then what’s the point of investing time at the expense of your other competing priorities. A few t...

Like any good marketer, it's about knowing your end customer and how they would like to consume information. All sales teams are different and finding the right communica...

Hah! You kinda answered your own question here. Create competitive intel that is easy to read and applicable to how Sales will use it! Sales doesn't want a novel about e...

The best advice I can give is to not throw everything including the kitchen sink into a competitive battle card. I've seen competitive intel of 5+ single space pages give...

I think of competitive intel like product managers think about their product. The first step is to listen to your stakeholders (or internal customers) from sales, produ...

Get them involved. Interview them to learn about their encounters with competitors. Here are things that I regularly ask my sellers. Which competitors are coming up mos...

First of all, it needs to be rooted in the day-to-day realities of sales and the conversations their having. If Product Marketing is coming up with competitive intel in a...

I try to create competitive intel at a couple of different levels of abstraction: High-level: Usually in the form of a 2X2 which demonstrates the biggest difference betw...

Start with goals and align your intel accordingly. Then map your materials to a narrative that is highly relevant and is focused on what your sales team really cares abou...

I try to use the Pyramid approach to all content. Start with just absolute essential information, then expand. This way sales reps are able to capture the exact right amo...

I first start with really solid positioning, which should clearly identify how your offering is differentiated from other competitors in the market and lean into that. Se...

One of the key things to consider with any information provided to a sales team is making sure you answer two questions: Why does it matter? What should they do with it?...

In my experience, the best way to communicate with sales people is to speak with them. They are so busy, and I find they don't read emails from PMMs, especially emails no...

Simple answer: You treat your sales team like a customer. Interview them to understand their competitive needs and challenges when articulating "value" or "differentiatio...

As a PMM, it can be frustrating to put a lot of work into something and have it sit unused. But I have a lot of empathy for my sales colleagues. Their lives are super bus...

At a high level Sales needs to operate on three planes. Defending against weaknesses, driving towards strengths and disseminating fear. Long written thought papers are th...

I love how candid this question is! It's true - we build a lot in PMM and largely don't know if it's being used. If you have a tech stack that has a social listening tool...

Getting sales buy in on what type of information they want early on can be really helpful (it can also be useful if they change their mind later on). Starting with a proo...

Agree w/ comments above. Easily digestible chunks of data presented in a battle card format (2 pages) is very effective. Remember to keep it brief and concise (e.g. 3 bul...

Timeliness and accessiblity are also key to providing value to your team. Providing a list of month-end/ quarter-end killshots speaking to the most up-to-date intel an...

Real time competitive insight direct from buyers. Easy way to collect this information is via a win/loss interviews. Simply ask questions regarding who else they consider...

One practice we had to inform competitive positioning strategy and enablement was analysing Closed Lost reasons in deals where we lost to a competitor. Here's an example...

Battlecards, training documentation, or whatever medium you choose to deliver this information should be built specifically for sales as the audience in mind. A couple qu...

In short: focus on enablement, not on battlecards.I don’t know how and why battlecards became the golden standard but I always felt that format miss the mark because it’s...

If you're banking that your sales teams will use your materials then you ask them first! Start with the top 2-3 sales reps or a sales manager who has a low-down on the b...

3 words - length, ROI, searchability. Length: Sales reps and customers alike want things to be short and to the point. I like to keep it to a punchy header with 2-3 sup...