Communication

Capture Competitor & Market Intelligence through Elicitation: Webinar Follow-up

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Teach Sales elicitation skills: they don’t get it anywhere else and it will help them close more deals and collect information to help your company develop better products. Some of the best elicitors are more introverted since they are likely to be more thorough in their preparation for elicitation interviews. Introverted people are often better listeners than extroverts, so are often more skilled at getting the other guy to talk!

How to Detect and Prevent Lying Behaviors

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Do you ever get that feeling that someone is lying to you, but you’re not quite sure, and you don’t want to ask them. We are surrounded by lies in our society, and it’s good to identify when you’re being lied to. As a competitive intelligence professional, it is imperative to be attuned as to whether the person you’re talking to is telling you the truth or not. Important decisions are being affected by the information and analysis we develop.

Capture Precious Competitor & Market Intelligence through Elicitation: Webinar April 8, 2009

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When interviewing people, they might wonder why you are asking certain questions, and over time they might even become a little suspicious of your motives. A skilled elicitor will entice the other person to talk and share information almost without the other person realizing that they’re sharing. A key to successful elicitation, aside from practice, is to prepare how you would like the conversation to flow, and be prepared to answer questions the customer might ask you.

Persuading through Competitive Intelligence Tools: the Cooperative Angle

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People like stories and can be very persuasive, and I notice stories also make it easy to avoid ego conflicts. In this case study, we used customer’s decision-making criteria rather than our opinions, to persuasively communicate our analysis. However, don’t be so persuasive that you forget about the dignity of the people you are addressing. Tell a good story that leads them to your conclusions, as though your audience had thought them up themselves. This works with everyone I have ever addressed regardless of profession or culture.

Visualize Your Competitors on a Radar Screen Competitor Map, a Great Competitive Intelligence Tool

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The Radar Screen is one of my favorite competitive intelligence tools. It is totally visual, and fits on one page for easy digestion. It can be used both strategically and tactically, and is a rich communication tool. Read about it in Adrian Slywotsky’s Value Migration. It’s a great way to visualize how competitors are positioned relative to you and each other. The uses for the Radar Screen competitor map are as rich as your imagination. The screen can be divided into 4 quadrants which might depict competitors by 4 separate business units, 4 different geographies, and on a tactical level 4 different reasons why customers buy.

Take a Cooperative Approach to Conflict Resolution

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I like the cooperative approach shared in Hot Buttons to solve conflicts with colleagues as it’s objective, focuses on constructive communication, and not “who dunnit? While cooperative intelligence skills of leadership, connection and communication don’t guarantee job security, they will help you stand out since many people have lower emotional intelligence: that is they have weak people skills.

Print Media Demise: Farewell to Colorado’s Rocky Mountain News

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Today is the last day for Colorado’s Rocky Mountain News. While we will miss our Rocky Mountain News, Denver is a mid-tier large city which challenges the limits of supporting two local papers. Print media in its many forms is threatened as people read their news, for free, on the Internet before it hits the newspapers. We have become a nation of “6 or 10 points of how to do something,” which while interesting, is cursory communication. Will we lose our competitive edge due to relying on this more shallow electronic communication?

Next Generation Competitive Intelligence Deliverables: SCIP Webinar

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Next generation companies will be more collaborative, with far more interactions among their customers, suppliers, employees and partners. This will mandate that competitive intelligence professionals incorporate next generation technology when they create competitive intelligence deliverables. This webinar illustrates cooperative intelligence practices, both cooperative communication and cooperative connection, by adding Web 2.0 to your communication and connection arsenal. Marty will illustrate case studies from his deep experience at Cisco Systems. While he focuses on competitive intelligence cases, these practices will benefit anyone who provides a service.

Sharpen Your Emotional Intelligence Skills

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In my field of competitive intelligence, strong emotional skills are essential since we’re often delivering people bad news which can cause stress since often “they” don’t want to hear bad news or threats to the business even if it is the truth. We have to stay strong not just to deliver bad news, but also be sensitive as to how “they” are going to take the news and not spring surprises, for example. What’s neat about EQ versus IQ is that we can learn and be coached to improve our EQ skills. Check out EQMentor, a web 2.0 delivery mentoring service to sharpen you EQ skills.

© 2025 Ellen Naylor