Competitive Platform Analysis

# Competitive Platform Analysis

Use this skill to decide **who to benchmark** and **where to find them** before
any scoring begins. A competitive analysis is only as good as its frame: the
wrong set makes the client look either unbeatable or doomed. The goal is a
defensible, decision-relevant set — not an exhaustive census.

## When to Activate

- About to start a competitive benchmarking project and need to define the competitor set first.
- Unsure which companies belong in Direct / Adjacent / Aspirational tiers.
- Need a defensible, pruned scope for a market landscape report.
- Has a positioning brief and wants to identify who contests that position.
- First step before running benchmark-methodology.

## Client positioning brief (establish first)

Before scoping the set, establish the client's positioning brief. If you don't
already have it, run a short brand-discovery interview to elicit it — do **not**
invent one and do **not** scope the set blind. The brief supplies:

- **Identity / aesthetic register** — what kind of studio or company this is and
  how it presents itself.
- **Offer** — what services or products it delivers.
- **Target clients** — who it sells to.
- **Differentiator** — the moat or positioning argument the client believes in.
- **Scoping consequence** — the implication for how to weight competitors (e.g.,
  prioritize by distinctiveness vs. capability overlap vs. price).
- **Strategic tension** — the paired axes that define the client's white-space