China Competitor Analysis Template
Use a structured China competitor analysis template to separate direct rivals, platform-native capabilities, adjacent solutions, and substitutes before an entry or positioning decision.
- VERSION
- 2.0.0
- UPDATED
- 2026-08-01
- LICENSE
- MIT
- FILES
- 04
npx skills add fffffrost/market-skills --skill research-competitorsCheck the actual test coverage
No execution report is published for this skill yet. Metadata checks and AI selection tests do not validate its deliverables.
Choose skills for your task ↗Keep the China market evidence with the comparison.
Download an editable ledger for local-language sources, regional availability, access dates, translations and unknowns. Free, no email required.
Download China evidence worksheetFor a general B2B study, use the competitor research work pack. See the real email-tool research example for source handling and delivery.
Classify the market before you compare it.
A useful China competitor analysis starts with the decision and buyer context—not a list of familiar brands. Use these four layers to decide what belongs in the core comparison, what needs a separate model, and what should stay on a watchlist.
Direct competitors
Products serving the same China buyer, core job, and purchase path.
Would the buyer compare or replace us with this option?Platform-native capabilities
Capabilities bundled into platforms the buyer already uses.
Does distribution, data, or bundling change the buying decision?Adjacent solutions
Services or tools solving part of the job through a different delivery model.
Does it compete for the same budget, owner, or outcome?Substitutes
Manual work, internal builds, or the decision to keep the status quo.
What existing behavior must change before a purchase happens?Run a China competitor analysis in six decisions.
Start with the business choice, not a feature table. Each step produces a reviewable artifact so facts, inferences, and unknowns remain separate.
Lock the decision
Name the buyer, core job, segment, geography, and decision the research must change.
OUTPUT / One decision frame and evidence cutoff date.Build the candidate pool
Search local-language queries, platform ecosystems, services, workflows, and known products.
OUTPUT / A longlist with a reason for including each candidate.Separate competitive roles
Assign each candidate to direct, platform, adjacent, substitute, reference, or watchlist.
OUTPUT / A core comparison set and a separately managed watchlist.Create an evidence ledger
Use dated first-party sources for conclusions and mark every gap as unknown instead of filling it in.
OUTPUT / Claim, source, date checked, confidence, and unknowns.Compare on buyer anchors
Compare buyer, job, purchase path, promise, proof, and delivery only within the relevant layer.
OUTPUT / Differences that can change an entry or positioning choice.Turn findings into action
State the implication, owner, next validation action, and review date for each important finding.
OUTPUT / A decision memo, not another feature spreadsheet.CHINA COMPETITOR ANALYSIS
DECISION FRAME
Decision this analysis must support:
Focal product:
China buyer / user:
Core job:
Purchase path:
Segment / geography:
Evidence cutoff date:
CANDIDATE CLASSIFICATION
01 DIRECT COMPETITOR
- Candidate:
- Buyer + job overlap:
- Purchase / replacement evidence:
- Include, monitor, or exclude:
02 PLATFORM-NATIVE CAPABILITY
- Platform + capability:
- Distribution / data advantage:
- Buyer adoption evidence:
- Include, monitor, or exclude:
03 ADJACENT SOLUTION
- Provider + delivery model:
- Shared budget / owner / outcome:
- Why it is not direct:
- Include, monitor, or exclude:
04 SUBSTITUTE
- Existing behavior or workaround:
- Why buyers keep it:
- Trigger for change:
- Include, monitor, or exclude:
EVIDENCE LEDGER
Claim | Source | Source type | Published / checked | Confidence | Unknown
COMPARISON
Candidate | Layer | Buyer | Core job | Value promise | Proof | Delivery | Entry implication
DECISION OUTPUT
Core comparison set:
Watchlist:
Evidence to validate next:
Positioning implication:
Owner + next review date:One B2B AI category, four different competitive roles.
These are illustrative classifications, not current market claims. A real analysis must replace them with dated sources and explicit inclusion decisions.
An independent product aimed at the same marketing team and workflow.
A capability embedded in a platform the team already operates every day.
A managed service that delivers the outcome without selling the same product.
An internal spreadsheet-and-agency workflow that buyers may prefer to keep.
- Focal product
- China target segment
- Decision to support
- Known competitors
- Layered landscape
- Anchored comparison
- Evidence ledger
- Decision implications
Know where the workflow must stop.
- Requires current Chinese and official sources for live market claims
- Does not replace legal commercial or investment due diligence
- Cannot infer competition from feature similarity alone
These conditions distort the result.
- The focal product and China buyer are not defined before discovery
- Global brands are compared while local platforms and substitutes are missed
- Evidence has no source date or confidence label
How the skill works
- 01Frame the China decision
- 02Establish the focal product baseline
- 03Discover local candidates broadly
- 04Classify competition narrowly
- 05Build an evidence ledger
- 06Translate findings into decisions
See it inside a complete job.
The case preserves task context, source material, execution trace, output excerpts, and human decisions.
Inspect the source before installing.
Instructions, templates, compatibility, and dependencies remain in one open directory.
- ├─SKILL.md
- ├─agents/openai.yaml
- ├─listing.yaml
- ├─references/research-template.md