Advertising Benchmarking purposes.Marketing communications personnel need to know how their ad expenditures measure up against the competition. Are you overspending? Are you not spending enough? Is there little "noise" in the marketplace so even a minimal amount of advertising will be noted by the audience? What products are companies promoting? What do they consider to be their best attributes and features as described in their advertising?
Publicity Benchmarking purposes.By showing the share of voice you are getting compared to the competition over time, you can readjust your publicity campaigns and efforts.
By showing the media penetration (how many stories of each competitor appeared in each publication) you are getting compared to the competition.
Keeping public relations personnel accountable for the publicity campaigns they initiate and execute.Apprising the marketing personnel, customer service department and sales force of the messages and positioning strategies the competitors are putting forth.Making future media placement decisions easier for the media director at the ad agency.Learning if there are any untapped markets as evidenced by the lack of activity in key vertical publications (what the competition is not doing is just as important as what they are doing).Learning of competitors' advertising placement trends - are competitors' activities heavy during trade shows (pre or post - show or both) or consistent throughout the year?Helping the marketing research analyst interpret their results better.If your own marketing research shows that competitors' products or trade names are enjoying better recall, you can match that information against the marketing activity (amount and frequency) they are putting forth to help you determine how active you need to be to get better recall.
Incorporation with other competitive research (information on pricing, distribution, corporate culture, etc.) to create a total composite on a competitor.Bringing a new employee up to speed very quickly on the competitive landscape. After reading our analysis, any new employee to your company will know how the competition promotes itself and to what extent.