A competitor window that shows what they are doing now

What this solves

Opening a competitor answered fewer questions than it raised. Their live advertising was not shown at all, and the button that promised it did nothing. And when a competitor had simply not moved, the window looked broken rather than calm: nothing told you "nothing changed" apart from "nothing was checked".

What changed

• Their live ads, in the window. A strip of the creatives they are running opens the Overview, and a new Ads tab holds more, with counts per channel and the date we last looked. Every state says what it means: not checked yet, checking now, checked and nothing running, or here is what is running.
• The gap, as one figure. Reach now shows a percentage while you and a competitor are comparable, and a multiple once you are orders apart — "−12%" or "1,118×" rather than a long number that needs working out.
• A history, not just a change feed. The Changes tab is now History and records every time we looked, not only what moved. "We re-read their pages and nothing changed" is now something the window can say.
• Run a scan whenever you want. Website checks run weekly on their own. A new Run scan button re-reads every page you watch on demand, and says how many pages and competitors that covers before it starts.
• Two buttons instead of one. "Research" is now Search competitors — it finds competitors you do not have yet — beside Run scan, which re-reads the ones you do.
• The window opens once. Opening a competitor from any list now opens exactly one window, "See active ads" takes you to their ad gallery, and links you shared before still work.

Where to find it

Competitors, then open any competitor. The new buttons sit at the top of that page.

Useful for

Anyone who wants to know what a rival is doing this week rather than this quarter: marketers checking live creative before planning their own, and founders tracking how far ahead the leaders really are.