Managerial identification of competitors: Representations, criteria and differences among managers
Abstract
Although there is a lot of research on competitive analysis based on consumer data, little is
known about how managers identify a product/brand as a competitor and on the criteria they
use. Moreover, several questions can be asked as to the fact that different managers placed in
similar market situations will or not define competition in the same way and on the basis of
similar criteria.
Our qualitative study shows that managers identify few competitors, mostly direct, and use
especially product descriptors and impact descriptors rather than customer descriptors.
Furthermore, managers tend to use few but very different criteria with the greatest differences
observed between sales and marketing managers.