Competitive Deal Reviews
Most deal reviews are post-mortems. The best are pre-mortems that prevent losses.
The Pre-Deal Review
When to Run
Big deals with identified competitors
Deals with patterns of losses
Strategic accountsThe Framework
**Who are we facing?** Identify primary and secondary competitors
**Why would they win?** Honest assessment of their strengths
**Why would we win?** Our unique advantages
**What's the trap?** Questions that hurt us
**What's our trap?** Questions that hurt themThe Post-Deal Debrief
For Wins
What actually won the deal?
What almost lost it?
What can we replicate?For Losses
Why did we really lose?
When did we lose (early/late)?
What would have changed the outcome?Creating Systematic Learning
Pattern Recognition
Group losses by competitor
Identify common objections
Find repeating failure pointsFeedback Loops
Sales → PMM: What's working/not working
PMM → Sales: Updated battlecards
Both → Product: Competitive gapsMetrics to Track
Deal review coverage
Win rate trends by competitor
Battlecard usage vs. outcomesCommon Pitfalls
"We lost on price"
Usually wrong. Price is a proxy for value not demonstrated."Their product is better"
Sometimes true. But "better" is relative to buyer priorities."It was a bad fit"
Maybe. But could you have known earlier?---
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