Business owners hoping to get ahead of their competitors should simply give them a call.

That’s according to Savannah Stewart, a marketing specialist writing for business2community.com. She advised that competitor analysis doesn’t have to be a long, drawn-out process. In fact, she thinks it’s very easy.

“Competitive analysis is just a fancy way to describe the process of checking out what your competitors are doing, or not going and using that information to your advantage,” she said. “After you’ve established who they are, you can begin to monitor and analyse.”

She suggested giving them a call to “find out how firm their pricing structure is” and if they throw in any discounts, extras etc to seal the deal. What’s more, if business owners find out their competitors don’t even sell over the phone, this is something they can use to their advantage – whether they own an independent company or operate under a franchise agreement.

Keeping track of competitors on social networks is crucial too, Stewart suggested. This is because many companies make a big deal of their upcoming promotions or deals on Facebook, Twitter and the like. This claim was supported by a report from inboundmarketingagents.com, which confirmed that critical data can be scraped from Twitter in particular – such as the time competitors tweet and the type of content they’re producing.

Taking a tour around their website wouldn’t hurt either. “Viewing a competitor’s website is… a great method to get information on new products they’ve released, positioning, special promotions and discounts,” Stewart revealed.

She concluded by recommending businesses sign up to receive their competitors’ email newsletters. This can give them a good idea of how the competitor is targeting its audience; as well as how it positions its messaging.