Research your competitors and market

Why this step matters

Competitors are proof that a market exists. They have already taught customers what to expect, what to pay and which words describe the problem. Studying them closely tells you where the market is crowded, where customers are frustrated and where a smaller, sharper product can win.

"We have no competitors" is almost never true. If nobody solves the problem, people are using a spreadsheet, an agency, a general-purpose tool or simply putting up with it. Those are your competitors too, and often the hardest ones to beat because they cost nothing to keep.

Good competitor research also feeds later steps. The language customers use in reviews becomes your landing page copy, competitor pricing sets the range for your own, and the channels they rely on show you where attention is expensive. Treat this step as building a reference sheet you will reuse through launch, not a one-off exercise.

How to do it

1. List direct, indirect and substitute competitors. Direct ones sell a similar product to the same people. Indirect ones solve the same problem another way (a service, a template, a marketplace). Substitutes are the workarounds you heard about in your interviews. Aim for 10 to 20 names.
2. Find them systematically. Search the problem in plain words, browse app stores and software review sites, check startup directories and launch platforms, and ask interviewees what they tried. Look at the "alternatives to" pages and paid search ads competitors run.
3. Build one comparison sheet. For each competitor record target customer, core promise, pricing model and entry price, free plan or trial, main channels, approximate team size and founding date. Keep it to what you can verify from their own site.
4. Mine the reviews. Read the one-to-three-star reviews on review sites, app stores and community threads. Group the complaints: too expensive, too complex, missing integration, poor support, wrong for a niche. Repeated complaints are openings.
5. Try the products. Sign up for free trials and onboarding emails. Notice how long it takes to reach the first useful result, what they ask for at signup and when they push you to pay.
6. Estimate the market bottom-up. Multiply the number of reachable customers by a realistic price. Use public data such as government business statistics, industry association reports and company filings rather than headline numbers from paid reports you cannot check.
7. Choose your position. Write one sentence: "For [specific customer] who [specific need], we are the [category] that [key difference], unlike [main alternative]." If you cannot fill in the difference, go back to the reviews.

What it costs and how long it takes

Desk research is free and takes three days to a week. Optional costs are a month of a competitor's paid plan to see the full product, or a short subscription to an SEO or traffic estimate tool. Keep the research time-boxed; the goal is a decision, not a report.

Free credits, perks and services that help

SEO, analytics and market intelligence tools sometimes appear in startup perk bundles and accelerator deal books; browse /perks and the SaaS discounts at /best/saas-perks. Accelerators and university incubators often give access to paid databases and market reports that are expensive to buy alone; see /accelerators and /programs. Public sources such as national statistics offices and company registries (for example, Companies House in the UK, or SEC filings for listed US companies) are free and reliable.

Common mistakes

• Ignoring substitutes. If your customers currently use a spreadsheet, you are competing with something free and familiar. Your product has to be clearly easier, not just better.
• Copying the leader. Matching a mature product feature for feature is slow and expensive. Win a narrow segment first.
• Trusting traffic estimates too much. Third-party traffic and revenue numbers are rough guesses. Use them for direction, not decisions.
• Treating a crowded market as a no-go. Crowded markets have proven demand. The question is whether a specific segment is badly served.
• Never updating the sheet. Competitors change prices and launch features. Revisit the comparison before launch and before setting your prices.

Go deeper

PRList lists the marketing and PR methods your competitors use to reach customers, with the tools and agencies behind each one, which helps you see which channels are crowded and which are open.