tactical competitive intelligence for bid teams
DESCRIPTION
Presentation given by Amplio Director, Alex King to a Strategic and Competitive Intelligence Professionals (SCIP) meeting in London, UK. The presentation discusses the many challenges CI Professionals have to provide tactical competitive intelligence for Sales & Bid teams. Most CI professionals are primarily funded and rewarded for doing strategic competitive intelligence work. The event discussed what they can do to have more of an impact with Sales & Bid teams to increase the value of their CI service.TRANSCRIPT
Tactical Competitive Intelligence
for Sales & Bid TeamsAlex King, Amplio
Strategic & Competitive Intelligence Professionals (SCIP), London.
18th November, 2015
© 2017 Amplio Services 1
[email protected] © 2017 Amplio Services 2
This presentation will show…
• There is a huge, unfulfilled demand for sales & bid team tactical competitive intelligence
• Fulfilling it can lead to quick competitive advantage because your competitors probably aren’t very good at it
• The results are relatively easy to measure proving the return on investment
• What do sales & bid teams want from the CI function?
• Gathering primary & secondary intelligence to meet this demand
• Breakout Discussion 1: Experiences of collecting CI
• How CI for Sales & Bid teams is different to strategy work
• Breakout Discussion 2: The importance of people-sources in CI analysis
• Difficulties of managing internal CI and knowledge silos
• Breakout Discussion 3: Overcoming knowledge silos
Contents & Agenda
3© 2017 Amplio Services
The demand for tactical competitive intelligenceWhat do sales & bid teams want from the CI function?
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In a survey of 178 bid professionals1 conducted with the Association for Proposal Management Professionals (APMP) “better competitive intelligence” was ranked as the 3rd
quickest way to improve bid performance
© 2017 Amplio Services
From a Bid Managers perspective…
1 How technology is changing Bidding (2017). Amplio Services
In another survey of Price to Win analysts2, 60% said that “better Competitive Intelligence” would have the quickest improvement on their results
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From a Price to Win perspective…
2 Price to Win Survey (2017). Amplio Services
Customers are also complaining that bidders fail to distinguish themselves and create a unique value proposition3
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From a Customers perspective…
3 Bids & Proposals Customer Survey (2017). Amplio Services
What to do about this?Gathering primary & secondary intelligence to meet demand
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Stakeholder Deliverables4
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4 Competitive Intelligence for Bid Teams (2017). Amplio Services
There were relatively low value scores for people-centred deliverables:
• Profiles of potential employees
• Profiles of Competitor Key Decision Makers
• Profiles of Customer Key Decision Makers
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Less appreciation of people intelligence
4 Competitive Intelligence for Bid Teams (2017). Amplio Services
There were relatively high value scores for:
• Cost Benchmarking Data
• Market Forecasts
• Specific information on a Sales or Bid Opportunity
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More appreciation of hard numbers
4 Competitive Intelligence for Bid Teams (2017). Amplio Services
Participants were asked to tick all sources that produce useful data, this is effectively a popularity measure5.
Again, we see a preference for hard figures found in annual reports and industry statistics. Senior managers and former employees were relatively unpopular sources of intelligence.
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Sourcing CI
5 Competitive Intelligence for Bid Teams (2017). Amplio Services
Finding Competitive Intelligence
Pick a discuss topic(in small groups)
1. To what extent are customers a good source of CI?
2. What are the best sources of ‘hard-to-find’ competitive intelligence and how could we integrate its collection into business as usual?
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Discuss:
• How does your experience match the research presented
• Does anyone in your group have any best practice examples of handling these issues
• What did you learn about difficulties you have in common with the people in your group?
Serving Bid Teams vrsserving StrategyThe difference in requirements and approach
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78% of SCIP respondents said that “developing strategy” was a key driver for CI in their company, compared to 33% for “driving sales” 6
This mirrored an earlier finding that 60% of members were funded by strategy or marketing, compared to just 13% by sales or business development.
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Strategy:the safe place for CI?
6 Career Planning Survey (2012). UKCIF
The core outputs to support Sales & Bid teams are not foreign to CI practitioners, however they are not the most common and will probably be done with different emphasis7
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Core outputs supporting Bids
7 Career Planning Survey (2012). UKCIF
Sales & Bid Teams
• Short-term, narrow focus• War Gaming
• Pricing
• Scenarios
Strategy & Senior Management• Long-term, broad focus
• Board Decision Making
• Market landscaping
• Forecasting
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Differences in Emphasis
• Winner takes all! There are no prizes for coming 2nd in a bid!
• Constantly changing market shares and trends
• Working within your restrictions (e.g. brand, technology, people) to make the most of what you have
• Manoeuvring the company to the optimal profit making opportunities
In more than half of cases, feedback from buyers said that the eventual winner was more “influential and engaged” in the pre-bid phase8.
This continues the theme of a greater emphasis on ‘softer’ factors in bidding.
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Why you win or lose
8 Bids & Proposals Customer Survey (2017). Amplio Services
Customers are overwhelmingly pre-occupied with transparency and fairness in the bid process9 this means they become a less reliable source of competitive intelligence as the bid continues
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How customer success looks
9 Bids & Proposals Customer Survey (2017). Amplio Services
• Research shows that some organisations have processes that make it very difficult not to accept the lowest price10
• There were an equally large group of buyers who trade technical capability with price
• This highlights the importance of win / loss analysis
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Customer buying trends
10 Bids & Proposals Customer Survey (2017). Amplio Services
Bid professionals are far more likely to base decisions on intangibles like “credibility” and “risk appetite” 11 than the more tangible factors like fluctuating material prices and labour productivity
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Bid decision makers
11 Price to Win Survey (2017). Amplio Services
• There are three generic ways companies compete. These are called ‘Value Disciplines’: 12 13
How companies compete
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Being the cheapest
Having the best quality
Using customer intimacy
Aldi
Waitrose
7-Eleven
12 Competitive Strategy (1980). Michael Porter. 13 Customer Intimacy and other Value Disciplines (1992). Michael Treacy & Fred Wiersema.14 Hyperperformance (2010). T.J. Waters
• Decision-makers develop predictability because “people repeat their successes and avoid their failures” 14
Pick a discuss topic(in small groups)
1. Do ‘organisational cultures’ prevail or are they just reflections of key decision makers at a point in time?
2. What are the best examples of measuring, qualifying and storing people-sourced intelligence you have seen?
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Discuss:
• How does your experience match the research presented
• Does anyone in your group have any best practice examples of handling these issues
• What did you learn about difficulties you have in common with the people in your group?
Knowledge SilosDifficulties of managing internal CI and knowledge silos
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Most respondents said that “better flow of internal information” was the quickest way to improve CI in their organisation. This is clear evidence of knowledge silos15
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Improving your CI function
15 Competitive Intelligence for Bid Teams (2017). Amplio Services
Companies that have international offices struggle to leverage the extra CI. Only 24% of participants said international offices provide valuable CI. Only 32% felt their company structure promoted cross-division or country information sharing16
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Cross-Company Knowledge Transfer
16 Competitive Intelligence for Bid Teams (2017). Amplio Services
59% were not satisfied with the information Senior Managers collect for them
The most common reasons indicate a lack of engagement, rather than lack of ability to collect the CI17
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Engaging Senior Management
17 Competitive Intelligence for Bid Teams (2017). Amplio Services
Pick a discuss topic(in small groups)
1. Can international and divisional silos be overcome?
2. How can practitioners successfully utilise their senior management to gather CI for them?
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Discuss:
• How does your experience match the research presented
• Does anyone in your group have any best practice examples of handling these issues
• What did you learn about difficulties you have in common with the people in your group?
• Thanks for reading. Check out more of our blogs at: http://www.amplioservices.com/blog
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