Competitive Analysis: Surveillance Versus Recon
First, let me say, surveillance is part of business. You must keep an eye on the competition. This includes visiting their website to read copy, searching news clippings for their name, etc. But when you start posing as a customer, it crosses the line and becomes reconnaissance. I don’t mind surveillance, but recon is an abuse of my time and money.
There’s one competitor in particular who has now performed recon on my system twice and was dumb enough to include their website name in the header…twice. I let it slide last summer, but it happened again this week so I’m calling them out. First offense was fishing for info on RealtyBaron’s ranking system last summer by posing as a real estate agent web merchant who is considering our service affiliate program:
Then, after RealtyBaron’s launch of Buyer Rebate Auctions last week, they again posed as a customer–this time a “home buyer” in Jacksonville:
“Hungry” indeed….hungry for inside scoop on RealtyBaron™. Down, boy…down.