“Here’s how I figure out if my competitive messaging is too aggressive. I ask myself if what I’m saying is…

• personal (i.e. going after someone’s character)

• private (e.g. DMs, 1:1 conversations, non-public info, etc.)

• punching down (i.e. going after a vendor with a small market presence)

If the answer is ‘no’ to each of these questions, then I’m OK.

Then after I test the waters with my messaging, I get into a rhythm of asking partners, customers, and prospects how they feel about my approach. That allows me to mitigate some risk.”

Dan Cmejla (Apollo.io’s VP of Community) casually dropped this framework to me over dinner at an offsite a couple months back.

He’s turned a lot of heads by consistently calling out one of our biggest competitors on LinkedIn. And it started almost immediately after he joined Apollo.

The result? Tons of new customers, massive jump in brand awareness, and social impressions up the wazoo.

Meanwhile, I see companies still debating whether or not they should mention competitors, frequency, level of aggression, etc.

TBH, you’ll figure out what’s most comfortable for you and what makes sense for your brand. It’ll change for everyone.

But I think Dan’s framework is a proven, simple way to get started.

IF YOU LIKE MONEY, PLEASE READ THIS 💸

Competitive Intel Salary Survey

We launched a salary survey to help competitive intel practitioners get paid what they deserve.

If you're a CI practitioner or PMM who has CI responsibilities, you should fill it out!

• it's 100% anonymous

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When you’re finished, share it with other CI folks in your network!

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What’s happening now

• 🎬 | The AI-generated video space is heating up with Higgsfield launching to challenge OpenAI’s Sora product [more]

• 🍿 | Indie movie theaters are thriving while massive competitors, like AMC, are struggling. How? By niching down [more]

• 🔎 | A case for why AI tools like Perplexity might not be the Google / search engine disruptors that they’re claiming to be [more]

• 💰 | Rubrik’s IPO filing lists multiple competitors as threats to their business, including Dell-EMC, IBM, Veeam, and Cohesity [more]

• 🖍️ | Crayon released their 2024 State of Competitive Intelligence report, featuring data from 700+ CI, product marketing, and enablement leaders [more]

EXAMPLES 🍊

Your weekly dose of vitamin C(ompete)

It’s common to run into these "kind-of" competitors… i.e. products that have similar capabilities to yours, but don’t really go after the same audience or support the same use case.

They can be tough to address and message against.

But Lavender did a great job against Grammarly in this blog. They were transparent, gave kudos to Grammarly where it made sense, and made it very clear when Lavender should be the preferred solution.

COMPETE GEEKS ONLY 🛑✋

From the Community

Here are a couple threads that got folks talking this week.

“Wait, what’s the Healthy Competition Community again?”

It’s where 100+ Product Marketers and Competitive Intel practitioners connect and share tips to help each other win.

Stay Healthy, my friends.

💚Andy