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Competitor analysis in financial services

Ian Youngman

This is the first comprehensive professional guide to the strategies and techniques of competitor analysis for the financial services industry. It explains how to set up systems and models to identify and analyse competitors and their products.

The book begins with an overview of the need for competitor analysis in financial services. It continues with the identification of competitors, the setting up of competitor analysis systems, and a consideration of key sources of information. The core of the book examines the process of analysis, modelling, dissemination and monitoring of information and its application for competitive advantage.

Key concepts in Competitor analysis in financial services:

Don't just copy others' systems
Understand the need for competitor intelligence
Find out what competitors do
Understand the methodology
Set up the systems to fit your company

This book is thoroughly practical in its approach and international in its coverage and is essential reading for all financial services professionals seeking competitive advantage.

ISBN 1 85573 331 5
ISBN-13: 978 1 85573 331 2
July 1998
224 pages  234 x 156mm  hardback  
£145.00 / US$245.00 / €175.00

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About the author

Ian Youngman has set up a market research department for an insurer, worked in research for a bank and broker, and was a founder of the General Insurance Market Research Association. He is an Associate of the Chartered Insurance Institute and a member of the Market Research Society. He is currently working as a freelance writer and researcher specialising in financial services. Also by Ian Youngman: Directors' & Officers' Liability Insurance Second Edition

Titles which may also be of interest:
Achieving transformation and renewal in financial services
Developing people and the corporate culture in financial services
Driving strategic change in financial services

Contents

The need for competitor analysis
 - The importance of competitor analysis
 - The increase in competition
 - Competition across type boundaries
 - Competition across borders
 - Importance for strategy and tactics
 - Takeovers and mergers
 - Benchmarking
 - Sources
 - Determining needs
 - Keeping secrets

Who are your competitors?
 - Banks
 - Insurers
 - Assurers
 - Bancassurers
 - Building societies
 - Friendly societies
 - Retailers
 - Industrial groups
 - Technology suppliers
 - Communication channels
 - Brokers
 - Telebrokers and direct insurers
 - Telebankers
 - Service suppliers
 - Manufacturers

Establishing the corporate framework
 - Resourcing and location of the department
 - Internal or external?
 - Managing the department
 - Baseline
 - Updating
 - Determining different needs
 - Preventing information overload
 - Internal payments - transfer pricing
 - Reporting lines

Establishing the strategic framework
 - Responsibility
 - What to seek
 - What to analyse
 - Who to tell
 - When to tell
 - How to tell
 - Liaison with competitors
 - Liaison with customers - wholesale
 - Liaison with customers - retail
 - Liaison with suppliers

Sources
 - Staff
 - Customers
 - Suppliers
 - Competitors
 - Trade associations
 - Syndication
 - Published information
 - On-line information
 - Newsletters and magazines
 - Government bodies and agencies
 - Product literature
 - Direct mail
 - Press and magazine advertising
 - Television and radio advertising
 - Recruitment adverts
 - Trade shows and fairs
 - Exhibitions and conferences
 - Mystery shopping
 - Foreign links
 - Cutting services

Analysis
Ad hoc
 - The base
 - Continuous assessment
 - Monitoring results
 - Interpretation
 - Red herrings
 - Past, present and future
 - Adding value

Systems
 - Paper files
 - Literature storing
 - Computers
 - Databases
 - Matrices
 - Retrieval

Models
 - Buy or set up?
 - Motor insurance
 - Household insurance
 - Health insurance
 - Life and related covers
 - Banking
 - Mortgages
 - Hardware and software
 - Polygons
 - SWOT analysis

Own products and services
Ad hoc
 - Feedback from staff
 - Feedback from customers
 - Campaign reports
 - Competiros' response to your product
 - Pilots
 - Tracking studies
 - Analysis

What competitors offer
 - Competitors now
 - Competitors future
 - Who to choose
 - Strategy, tactics and goals
 - Products
 - Services
 - Resources, capabilities and networks

External suppliers
 - Market research agencies
 - Management consultants
 - Information and report providers
 - Academia
 - Government and other official bodies
 - Systems and models suppliers
 - Security firms
 - How to choose

How to distribute the information
 - Who wants what
 - Up the line
 - Down the line
 - Across the line
 - Customers
 - Competitors
 - Media
 - How to provide the information
 - When to provide information
 - Continuous versus ad hoc research
 - Selling the need for competitor analysis internally

How to use the competitor analysis function
 - Strategy
 - Tactics
 - Different levels
 - Shadow plans
 - Product launch
 - Product changes
 - Product withdrawal
 - Reacting to competitors
 - Sales
 - Service improvement
 - Training
 - Takeovers and mergers
 - Joint ventures

Further strategic considerations
 - Analysis not information
 - Projection forward
 - Misinformation
 - Brainstorming
 - Trees and forests
 - Ignoring information
 - Counter-intelligence
 - Business ethics
 - Legality
 - Codes of practice
 - Industrial espionage
 - Trading
 - Media contacts