Competitive Analysis using Jobs To Be Done
Competitive Analysis is important to know where our product stands in the market. The insights gained through such an analysis help us identify priorities and strategise effectively. The goal is to discover what gives us an edge; be it innovation, partnership or something else.
Competitive Analysis of products is usually done by comparing features. It helps visualise how our product fares against other products — you guessed it — on features. To do this successfully, you need to know which features add the most value to the user and thus the product.
That’s where the Jobs To Be Done (JTBD) framework comes in. The best way to be objective about competitive analysis is by comparing products using the value they bring to the user’s workflow.
A workflow is a set of tasks a user has to complete to achieve a goal.
On doing this, the features that matter to the user naturally reveal themselves.
A competitive analysis using the JTBD framework involves two steps -
1. Zoom Out
2. Zoom In
Zoom Out
To zoom out is to take a step back and work out the high-level workflow of the user.
This requires a very good understanding of the user’s job to be done and if that is not there, you’re banished to the bloody red ocean of cut-throat competition.
Once you have the task in the workflow listed down, write down all the products that can help with each of those tasks. For example, let us consider the workflow of a user who wants to write an article.
In the matrix above, Medium seems to add the most value to ‘Writing an article’ workflow. Let’s say you are a product manager at Draft (draftin.com) and wanted to understand where your product stands in this workflow. All you need to do is Zoom In.
Zoom In
Pick the area/s you are adding value and dive into the low-level tasks. At this point, you’ll have a focused list of competitors now. I am now going to -
- Break down the ‘She/he iterates through many drafts and shares it with friends for feedback’ task
- List the products that can be used to perform that task.
Draft adds unique value to the user’s workflow by
- Letting reviewers / collaborators to make changes directly to the user’s document
- Allowing the user to merge those changes as needed
Clearly, Draft has its place in the workflow and that is reassuring. To grow the product, Draft can zoom out to the high-level workflow and pick a task and solve it efficiently. That need not always be through developing a feature.
For example, if Draft were to take on ‘The user gets the final draft proofread’ task, they can either partner up with Grammarly. Or provide an offline proofreading service, with humans at the other end of the line.
Having more features doesn’t always mean you have a better product. It might be good if you want to win a feature race but not if you want a successful product. Most often than not, it does not result in a competitive advantage.
When you are using the JTBD approach for your product, give it due thought and list down all competitors. Both in your industry and outside it. We don’t live in a void. There are many digital and physical products that compete for the same job.
In the above example, a user might choose to publish an article in a newspaper. A lot of writers still do so. With a feature-based analysis, you would be comparing your product only against other blogging engines. The power of using JTBD is that it will help you uncover unconventional competitors.
A user hires a product to help perform a job. And the product is fired if it does not make it easy for the user to make progress. And all the product needs to do is to the user to do the job efficiently. It may take just one feature to do it!
