How to do a UX Competitor Analysis

And convince team members and stakeholders on changes you think would be beneficial or to argue for innovation

The strengths and weaknesses of your competition will be a valuable resource of information when you decide to make improvements in your products. It will help the team to solve usability problems through a deeper understanding of where the product or service relies on the market.

In simple words, you will be empowering your business choices.

Market Opportunities
A conscious analysis of your research will show you gaps that your competitors aren’t able to fit. A new feature will rise when you identified the problem. You will have the opportunity to elaborate a plan for your audience based on the analysis of your research, developing solutions or products that your actual audience needs.

One of the limitations of UX competitor analysis is when you spend too much time looking for information that you miss the opportunity to create innovative solutions. It’s always important to believe in your skills and insights.

That’s one of the most relevant differences with your competitors.

Understand your goals
Your goals should be possible and assessable so consider the issues you’re trying to address with the competitor analysis.

· Why are you doing this competitor analysis?

· What do you hope to achieve?

· Will this research impact UX decisions?

· ‘Really’ know your competition

At this point, you might want to open a Google spreadsheet or chart and start creating a table of information. A good number at the beginning stage is around 5–10 direct and indirect competitors, so you can maintain and track what your competition is doing.

The direct competition consists of those people and companies who are doing what you do already. You share the same customers and they offer the same product or service that you do.

Indirect competition is composed of those who offer something similar to what you offer. If it is not the first part of their product or service but the second or third.

Look for commonalities among competitors
Is always a good idea to write down the actions users can perform, as well as the user journey of competitor products and services. See if they match what you are offering.

Things to consider:

· The tone and copy of the competitor

· Good and bad features

· User reviews

· Wait/load times

· Customer service

· Design

Analyze and summarize
Create a small summary of what you have found out as well as what impact the information will have. This stage is perfect for identifying design opportunities because you understand your competitors’ flaws (as well as your own).

Your analysis and summary can be used to convince team members, and stakeholders of any design changes you think would be beneficial or to argue for innovation.

Present your UX competitor analysis
After you have compiled your research, analyzed it and synthesized the information into actionable insights, it is time to prepare a presentation of your findings for clients or stakeholders.

This is your opportunity to act on those findings. You can even calculate the ROI of your UX activities to add weight to your findings.