Exercises: Information search and competitor analysis

Explain what information each source can give you and when to use it: survey, in-depth interview, direct observation, and internet search. Apply it to this project: a healthy breakfast stall at the school fair.

Distinguish between direct and indirect competition using this case: a fresh juice stall at the fair. Its direct competition would be another drink stall; its indirect competition would be the hallway vending machine or a water bottle brought from home. Add two examples of your own of indirect competition for a study notes app.

The figure is a positioning map of the drink stalls at the fair based on their price and how healthy their product offering is. Points A, B, and C are existing stalls; the question mark marks an empty area.

1. a) Describe where the gap in the market is according to the map (what combination of price and healthy offering no one is covering).
2. b) Propose a product for that gap and explain what you should check before launching (why is it empty?).

Explain what a potential customer is and why 'everyone' is not a valid answer to the question 'who are you selling to?'. Define the potential customer of these three school projects: a coffee stall, an entrepreneurship workshop for parents, and a sixth-form notes app.

Distinguish fact from opinion with these examples from research into the canteen: (a) '$60\ \%$ of students don't finish their second course'; (b) 'the canteen food is bad'; (c) 'on Tuesdays there are $15$ kg more leftovers than on Thursdays'. Explain why you need data and not just opinions to decide, and how you would turn opinion (b) into something measurable.

List four questions you should answer about your competition before opening a stall at the fair (what they sell, at what price, what customers criticise about them, what they don't offer) and explain what you would do with each answer.

Explain what a market niche is (a small group with a specific, poorly served need) and identify the niche of these products: sunglasses for dogs, gluten-free breakfasts at the fair, skateboarding lessons for the over-$40$s. Why can a niche be a good entry door for a small project?

Your team wants to sell smoothies at the fair. List three things you could find out by observing (without asking anyone) last year's fair: the busiest queue times, which stalls sold out, which products were left over, prices people paid without flinching. Explain what advantage observation has over the survey.

Design a five-question survey to validate a crepe stall at the school fair. Each question must measure something useful (how much they would pay, what flavours, what time they would buy, how many they would buy, who they currently buy from). Explain why one of the questions should not be "Would you buy crepes?" (yes/no).

Conduct a SWOT analysis for your class project (choose a real one or the breakfast stall): two weaknesses, two strengths, two opportunities, and two threats. Then cross-reference the information: write a strategy that uses a strength to take advantage of an opportunity, and another that defends a weakness against a threat.

It is said that an entrepreneurial mindset consists of seeing opportunities where others only see problems. Choose an everyday problem in your environment (queues, boredom during rainy breaktimes, unused textbooks, grandparents who do not use mobile phones) and turn it into an opportunity: what underlying need exists, who it affects, and what solution you would sell.

Design the express market research (one week, $0\ \text{€}$) to validate an 'organised backpacks' service (a weekly at-home backpack check for families): which three sources you would use, how many people you would ask, which three questions you would ask and what you would observe. Explain what result would make you carry on and which would make you abandon it.

At last year's fair there were $5$ food stalls: $2$ selling sweets, $2$ selling savoury food and $1$ selling drinks. The sweet ones sold $60$ units on average, the savoury ones $85$ and the drinks one $140$. This year $3$ sweet stalls have already signed up.

1. a) Interpret the data: where the unmet demand seems to be and what the averages tell you about the split between stalls.
2. b) Decide what you would set up and defend it with the data, mentioning one uncertainty the data does not resolve.

Do the SWOT analysis of this project: 'hiring out footballs and board games at break times, run by students with reward points'. Write two weaknesses, two strengths, two opportunities and two threats, and then cross-reference them: an SO strategy (using a strength to seize an opportunity) and a WT strategy (defending a weakness against a threat).

Your survey about the breakfast stall comes back with: $80$ respondents, $70\ \%$ would pay up to $2\ \text{€}$, the most requested flavours are yoghurt with fruit ($45\ \%$) and toast ($30\ \%$), and the slot with the most buyers would be the mid-morning break.

1. a) Explain which three decisions on product, price and logistics you make straight away with this data.
2. b) Point out two questions the survey did NOT answer and that you need before buying anything (allergens, the real quantity they would buy, competition from the café next door) and how you would find them out.

Two teams research the same thing: 'is there a market for a youth reading club in the neighbourhood?'. Team A asks in its class WhatsApp group ($24$ enthusiastic replies); team B interviews $10$ varied people from the neighbourhood and observes the public library one Saturday.

1. a) Compare the reliability of both samples and name the bias in method A.
2. b) Explain what information team B's observation provides that no survey can give, and what provisional conclusion you would draw from B's data even if it were less enthusiastic.

At the school market, there are two costume jewellery stalls: yours sells handmade bracelets for $3\ \text{€}$, and the other sells bracelets for $2\ \text{€}$ bought from an online shop and relabelled. Last year, the cheaper stall sold twice as much.

1. a) Analyse your competitor: what advantage do they have, what is yours, and which type of buyer does each appeal to?
2. b) Propose two differentiation strategies other than lowering the price, and explain why competing on price alone would be a bad idea for you.

A team surveyed their $30$ best friends about their study notes organisation app: $95\ \%$ said they would "definitely" use it. When launched, $12$ people downloaded it in the whole school.

1. a) Explain what biases the survey had (who they asked, how they asked) and why they inflated the result.
2. b) Redesign the research: who you would ask, how many people, with which three questions, and what you would do besides asking.

You are going to sell breakfasts at the fair and have noted down the competitors' prices: croissants at $1,50\ \text{€}$ (stall A), juice and toast at $2,50\ \text{€}$ (stall B), and mass-produced pastries at $1\ \text{€}$ (stall C). Your breakfast (yoghurt with fruit and granola) costs $1,10\ \text{€}$ to produce.

1. a) Reason what price range you should operate within and what happens if you set it at $1\ \text{€}$ or $3\ \text{€}$.
2. b) Decide on a price, justify it using the data, and explain what additional information you would like to have before confirming it.

A team wants to set up a gourmet sandwich stall at the district fair. Its competition analysis: $6$ food stalls last year, all standard fast food, prices between $2\ \text{€}$ and $3,50\ \text{€}$, $15$-minute queues at lunchtime and complaints about the lack of vegetarian options.

1. a) Sum up the analysis in one opportunity sentence: what gap there is, for whom and with what promise.
2. b) Design two cheap experiments before the fair to check the gap is real (a trial menu at break time, a pre-sale among teachers) and what result you would measure in each.

The neighbourhood stationer's has been losing customers for $3$ years. The owner blames the internet, but a quick analysis shows: $80\ \%$ of her sales are photocopies and September school supplies; she doesn't open in the afternoons, when schools finish; and she hasn't had a window display for years.

1. a) Reinterpret the problem: is it online competition or her own decisions? Separate the external factors from the internal ones in the analysis.
2. b) Propose a plan of three actions based on the analysis (opening hours, window display, services the internet doesn't give) and explain what the owner would measure in $3$ months to know whether she is recovering.

'Market research is a waste of time: great ideas are seen by visionaries, not by surveys.' Someone answers with the quote that 'if I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses'.

1. a) Summarise the best argument of each position on the role of research when innovating.
2. b) Propose a workable middle ground for your school project: what you decide with research (price, timing, flavours) and what you decide with your own vision (the core idea), and justify the split.

Your team has two ideas for the fair and only time for one: a crêpe stall (demand proven last year, but there will be $2$ competitors) or a temporary tattoo stall (nobody has ever done it, demand unknown).

1. a) Design how to decide with information in $5$ days: what data you collect on each idea, with what method and at what cost.
2. b) Set the decision rule in writing (what minimum result each idea needs to win) before looking at the data, and explain why fixing the rule beforehand prevents self-deception.

Analyse this mini-map of the competition at the neighbourhood Christmas market: churros ($2\ \text{€}$, always a queue), handmade clothing ($15\ \text{€}$, few sales), Christmas sweets ($4\ \text{€}$, average sales), wooden toys ($12\ \text{€}$, average sales). There is nothing between $4\ \text{€}$ and $12\ \text{€}$ and no hot drinks to take away.

1. a) Locate two market gaps and formulate a proposal for each (product, price, customer).
2. b) Choose one gap and design the one-afternoon proof of concept: what you would sell, what you would note down and what number would make you repeat the following year.

Unit challenge. Is there room for a new youth business in your town? You are going to conduct an express market study to find out.

1. Search for official information: Go to the INE website (ine.es) and check the municipal register (padrón) for your town or province. Obtain the total population figure and the youth population (aged 15 to 29). Calculate its percentage share of the total to one decimal place (for example, $16,4\,\%$).

2. Competitor analysis: Choose a sector (leisure, fashion, technology, or catering) and identify three businesses in your area that target this audience. Create a comparative table evaluating: variety of offer, price range (low, medium, or high), and their social media communication strategy.

3. Reasoned proposal: Design an executive summary sheet (maximum one page) with your business idea. Justify its potential viability based on INE data and define your unique competitive advantage compared to the three competitors analysed.

Assessment criteria:

• Rigorous extraction of demographic data from the INE and correct percentage calculation.

• Analytical quality and thoroughness of the competitor comparison table.

• Coherence between the opportunities detected in the environment and the proposed competitive advantage.