If “We’re also looking at Competitor X…” still makes your team tense up, this is for you.
A few months ago, a founder friend sent me a panicked Slack message:
“We just lost a deal to a competitor I’ve never even heard of. The rep said, ‘They had a better answer when I asked about X.’
We don’t even have an answer for X. How is that still happening?”
This is way more common than we like to admit.
Most technical founders and sales leaders are shipping product fast, iterating on pricing, tweaking messaging… but when competitors show up in deals, the team is still winging it.
- SDRs are guessing at how to qualify against alternatives
- AEs are improvising differentiation on live calls
- Product marketing is pushing out docs that never get opened
- Leadership is getting “we lost to price” as the default excuse
Meanwhile, “battlecards” live in some Notion graveyard last updated three quarters ago.
Tools like Playwise HQ (AI-powered competitive battlecards) exist to fix that mess. But the more interesting question for this audience isn’t “what is it?”, it’s who actually uses this kind of thing, and what do they get out of it?
Let’s walk role by role through how a modern competitive intel system shows up in a real revenue org.
AEs / Sales Reps: Handling “We’re Also Evaluating…” Without Flinching
If you’ve ever been on a call where a prospect casually drops:
“We’re also talking to [Competitor X] and [Competitor Y]…”
…you know the next 60 seconds can decide the entire deal.
Why frontline sellers care
AEs don’t need 40-page competitor decks. They need fast, accurate, in-the-moment answers:
- What does this competitor actually do better than us?
- Where do they fall down?
- What’s the cleanest way to reframe the conversation in our favor?
When that intel is missing, reps default to either:
- Talking trash (which usually backfires), or
- Hand-waving and hoping the prospect doesn’t dig deeper
Neither works at scale.
What they get from a battlecard platform
Instant, AI-generated competitor profiles
No more “let me get back to you” while they ping Slack. Reps can pull up structured intel in seconds.Clear strengths/weaknesses and talk tracks
Concrete ways to say: “Here’s where they’re strong, here’s where we’re stronger, and here’s what that means for you.”Faster cycles by killing objections early
If a rep can address the competitor head-on in the first or second call, you avoid the late-stage “we went with someone else” email.Live intel from other reps baked in
When someone closes a deal against a new competitor, that learning doesn’t die in a call recording. It feeds back into the system.
One way I’ve heard this summarized (paraphrased):
The moment your reps are guessing about competitors, you’ve already given up leverage.
The job of a tool like Playwise HQ is to remove that guesswork.
SDRs / BDRs: Better Qualification, Not Just More Meetings
Early-stage conversations are usually a blur of:
- “What’s your current stack?”
- “Do you have budget?”
- “Are you the right person?”
But for technical founders and GTM teams, who else is in the mix matters just as much.
Why SDRs actually need competitive intel
SDRs aren’t just booking time; they’re shaping the deal before it even exists.
If they know:
- Which competitor the prospect is using now
- What that tool is missing
- How your product typically beats it
…they can set the AE up to win instead of walking into a mystery.
What changes when SDRs have battlecards
-
Sharper first-call questions
Instead of generic discovery, SDRs can ask:- “You mentioned you’re on [Competitor]. Where do you feel it’s limiting you?”
- “How are you handling [specific workflow] today?”
Competitive context baked into qualification
They can quickly tell: “This is a good fit against Competitor A, but a tough one against Competitor B.”Higher meeting → opportunity conversion
Because the AE isn’t starting from zero. They’re walking into a call with context, positioning, and landmines already mapped.
For founders: this is how you stop burning AE time on meetings that were doomed from the first touch.
Sales Enablement: Finally Shipping Content That Reps Actually Use
If you own enablement, you’ve probably:
- Built gorgeous battlecards in Google Slides
- Launched them with fanfare
- Watched adoption crater to ~0% within a month
Reps don’t hate enablement. They hate stale enablement.
Why enablement teams care
Their job is to turn strategy into something the field can actually use. But when intel lives in static decks, you get:
- “Where’s the latest version?”
- “This is out of date.”
- “I just ask in Slack; it’s faster.”
What a dynamic system gives them
Living battlecards instead of PDFs
Competitor changes pricing? Launches a new feature? Messaging evolves? The system updates, and reps see it immediately.Direct feedback loop from the field
Reps can add what they’re hearing on calls, and that rolls into the shared intel — no more “tribal knowledge” stuck in DMs.-
Training built on real scenarios
Instead of generic objection handling, enablement can run sessions like:- “How we beat [Competitor X] when they lead with feature Y”
- “What to say when a prospect brings up their new pricing model”
One founder put it to me like this:
“Our old battlecards were basically a knowledge tomb. We needed something that behaved more like a living system than a static asset, because static battlecards quickly go stale.”
Sales Managers: Coaching With Actual Competitive Context
Managers are supposed to help reps navigate tough deals… but they’re not on every call, and they don’t hear every objection live.
Why managers need this view
Without structured intel, coaching sounds like:
- “Try to focus on value, not price.”
- “Ask better discovery questions.”
Useful, but vague.
With competitive data, coaching can be:
- “You’re losing to [Competitor X] when they position around [specific angle]. Let’s practice how to reframe that.”
- “Your win rate against [Competitor Y] is solid, but you struggle when [Competitor Z] shows up. Let’s drill there.”
What they get from a battlecard platform
Deal-level competitor patterns
See which competitors are showing up, where you’re losing, and why.Specific objection examples
Real phrases prospects are using, so you can train reps on the exact language they’re hearing.-
Targeted coaching, not generic pep talks
You can spot:- “This rep struggles when [Competitor A] is in the deal.”
- “This team is great on product depth, weak on ROI vs. [Competitor B].”
For technical leaders: this is where “we’re a product-led company” meets “we actually know how to sell against the market.”. Delivering on these capabilities also shows a direct ROI that can be tied to your CI program.
Product Marketing & Competitive Intel: From Research to Revenue
Product marketing and CI folks often do great work that never fully lands with the field.
They’re:
- Tracking competitor launches
- Updating positioning
- Building comparison pages
…but can’t always prove that any of it changed deal outcomes.
Why PMM/CI teams care
Their biggest headache: adoption.
They don’t just want to be the “slide factory.” They want to:
- Push new messaging to the field
- See how it performs in real deals
- Iterate based on what actually works
What a central battlecard system enables
Single source of truth for competitive intel
New insights, messaging tweaks, and positioning updates go straight into the same system reps are already using.Real-time field feedback
If reps start hearing a new competitor pitch or pricing model, PMM sees it quickly and can respond.-
Clear line from intel → revenue
You can tie:- “We changed our positioning vs. [Competitor X] in March”
- “Our win rate vs. them improved by Y% in Q2”
This is how competitive programs graduate from “nice docs” to “direct revenue lever.”
Revenue Leaders (VP Sales / CROs): Protecting Pipeline at Scale
If you own the number, you don’t just care that you’re losing deals — you care why.
Relying on “we lost to price” as the default explanation is basically saying, “We don’t know.”
Why execs care about competitive intel
They need to answer questions like:
- Which competitors are actually dangerous vs. just loud?
- Where are we consistently weak in the sales cycle?
- Which competitive bets are paying off?
What they get from a platform like this
Win/loss tied to competitor mentions
Not just “lost” — but “lost to [Competitor Y] when they led with [angle Z].”Competitive overlays on forecasts
Deals in stage 3 against a weak competitor ≠ deals in stage 3 against your biggest rival. You can forecast with that nuance.ROI on competitive initiatives
You ran a new enablement push vs. [Competitor X]? You can see if it actually moved conversion rates.
As one leader put it (rephrased):
“I don’t need more stories about why we lost. I need patterns I can act on.”
Marketing Teams: Real Customer Language, Not Guesswork
Marketing is out there writing:
- Landing pages
- Comparison pages
- Ads
- Thought leadership
But a lot of that is based on internal assumptions, not how buyers actually talk.
Why marketing should care about battlecards
They rarely sit on sales calls all day. So they miss:
- The phrases prospects use when comparing tools
- The claims competitors are making
- The objections that keep coming up
What they gain from this kind of system
-
Voice-of-customer straight from the field
Real snippets like:- “We’re on [Competitor] but they can’t handle X at our scale.”
- “We like their UI, but reporting is a mess.”
Insight into competitor narratives
If competitors are pushing “we’re the easiest to implement,” marketing can decide whether to counter, ignore, or reframe.Alignment with what sales is actually saying
Messaging doesn’t live in a vacuum. You can make sure what’s on the website matches what’s working in live conversations.
This is how you avoid the classic “Our marketing site says one thing, our reps say another” problem.
Customer Success: Renewals and Expansions Under Competitive Fire
If you’re in SaaS, renewals are rarely a formality anymore. Competitors are actively targeting your customers — especially the bigger ones.
Why CS teams need competitive intel
CSMs are often surprised by:
- “We’ve been talking to [Competitor] and they’re offering us a deal.”
- “We’re considering consolidating tools and might move off your platform.”
If they only hear about this at renewal time, it’s usually too late.
What changes with shared battlecards
-
Prepared CSMs when customers get poached
They know how to respond when a customer mentions a specific competitor, including:- Where you’re stronger
- Where you’re weaker but can mitigate
- How other customers made similar decisions
Stronger renewal conversations
Instead of generic “we’ve delivered value,” CSMs can articulate differentiated value vs. the exact alternatives on the table.Earlier churn risk signals
If multiple accounts start mentioning the same competitor, CS can flag it and loop in product, sales, and leadership.
In other words: you’re not just defending logos; you’re defending them with a plan.
The Throughline: Competitive Intel Isn’t a “Sales-Only” Problem
Most teams treat competitive intel as “something we should probably put on a slide for sales.”
In reality, it touches:
- How SDRs qualify
- How AEs position
- How managers coach
- How PMM and CI prioritize
- How marketing writes
- How CS defends revenue
- How leadership allocates resources
Platforms like Playwise HQ work because they recognize that every role in the revenue engine is dealing with competitors — just in different ways.
Put simply:
- Reps get confidence
- Enablement gets adoption
- PMM/CI gets impact
- Leaders get patterns
- Marketing gets language
- CS gets defense
All off the same underlying competitive signal.
Wrap-Up: Don’t Let “We Lost to Competitor X” Be a Mystery
If your team is still:
- Guessing what to say when competitors come up
- Passing around outdated docs
- Relying on anecdotes to explain losses
…you’re leaving winnable deals (and renewals) on the table.
A modern, AI-powered battlecard system isn’t about more content. It’s about making sure every role has the right competitive context at the exact moment they need it.
I’m curious:
- How are you handling competitive intel in your team today?
- Is it centralized and living, or scattered across Slack, Notion, and people’s heads?
- If you’ve tried battlecards before, what actually made them stick (or fail)?
Drop your experiences (and horror stories) in the comments, would love to hear how other technical founders and GTM teams are tackling this.
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