Mastercard Payment Gateway Services (MPGS) is a B2B division of Mastercard that provides digital commerce technology solutions to merchants, banks, and payment service providers. They operate in a highly competitive market with many challengers and disruptors.
To improve their competitive intelligence program, they used Crayon to help them adopt the point of view of their competitors. And create a defensive playbook that allows them to anticipate and respond to competitive threats.
Creating a Competitive Intelligence Week
One of the ways they did this was by organizing a Competitive Intelligence Week. During a five-day event, they invited all their team members and stakeholders from sales, marketing, product management, customer success, and more to participate in workshops, tutorials, and discussions about competitive intelligence and using Crayon.
The event was a huge success. It helped Mastercard create a culture of collaboration and learning around competitive intelligence.
Note: Many of you might not be able to have a 5-day CI event. Consider ways to pull together cross-functional teams to learn about CI and available tools, templates, etc. Plus, use that time to gather feedback on better supporting each group.
Competitive Intelligence War Games To Uncover Weaknesses
The event also helped Mastercard discover new ways to use Crayon to support various projects and initiatives.
For example, they used Crayon to conduct war games. War games are exercises where you pretend to be your competitor and try to find weaknesses in your company’s strategies. Doing this lets you identify potential threats and opportunities you may have overlooked or underestimated.
Note: Now, this is awesome! Mastercard is embracing and uncovering its weaknesses. By understanding where they are weak, they can become stronger. I talked about this a couple of newsletters ago. Here’s the link if you missed it: Click Here.
They also used Crayon to create personas for their competitors’ customers. The personas described their target audience’s characteristics, needs, preferences, and behaviors. By creating personas of their competitors’ customers, Mastercard was able to understand what motivates them to choose one solution over another. Imagine the tactics you can develop from this exercise!
By conducting these activities, Mastercard was able to gain a deeper understanding of their competitive landscape and their position in it. Based on the insights, they improved their products, services, messaging, pricing, and more.
As a result, they were able to differentiate themselves from their competitors and deliver more value to their customers.
So there you have it. That’s how Mastercard uses Crayon (a tool) and other activities to empower every corner of their organization with competitive intelligence.
If you want to read the original case study: Click Here
Key Take-Aways: How Mastercard Uses Competitive Intelligence
- Consider how to get cross-functional teams together to learn and discuss competitive intelligence.
- Use that time to work together as a team and build a culture of collaboration.
- Consider playing games by acting like competitors to discover weak spots in your products and plans.
- Develop personas of your competitors’ customers to help you understand why some people might choose other companies.
- Use these insights to learn about your competition and market position.
- Then, improve your products, services, and strategies.
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