Bloom had his first exposure to the ways of competitive
intelligence when he worked in risk management at a large New York
City bank. There, he gained practice studying big financial
institutions, primarily through monitoring the information in
public filings. His motivation for becoming an entrepreneur,
however, came from a much more personal encounter with competitive
intelligence.
"When I was at the bank, I had a golden retriever named
Lucky who, unfortunately, did not live up to his name," says
Bloom. "He had a condition called hip dysplasia and needed
surgery that cost about $3,000."
Bloom had a health-insurance policy on Lucky, but he discovered
it excluded the treatment his pet actually needed, plus many more.
When he looked for a better deal, something like the prepaid
membership plans humans use for dental care, he found nothing for
pets.
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Further investigation revealed most pet-insurance policies
carried limitations similar to those that had left him so
dissatisfied. After confirming the niche was underserved, Bloom
left his job at the bank in 1996 and started Pet Assure. One of the
most important assets he brought with him was his appreciation of
competitive intelligence.
As a result, Pet Assure has unusually comprehensive
intelligence. At 15 to 18 trade shows per year, Bloom and his
employees drop by rivals' booths to ask questions and gather
marketing material. "You find your competitors there, and
it's easy to gather information," he explains. In addition
to pet-industry conventions, Bloom attends shows concerning
employee benefits because selling memberships to companies for use
in their benefits packages is an important distribution
channel.
Bloom also subscribes to numerous periodicals covering the pet
and veterinary industries. Although Pet Assure rarely markets
directly to consumers, preferring to sell to intermediaries such as
insurance companies, PPO networks and other businesses, Bloom reads
the likes of Cat Fancy and Dog Fancy to see articles
about, and advertisements for, rivals who do. Veterinary
Economics and similar publications illuminate opponents'
approaches to the vets who care for Pet Assure's members'
animals.
And it doesn't stop there. Bloom employs a clipping service
to read a wide variety of general and special-interest
publications. When a key word turns up, the service sends him a
copy of the article. "Clipping services are great," he
says. "We use generic key words as well as our
competitors' names.
"Customer feedback is also important. We get a lot of calls
complaining about competitors' products." Employees
answering the phone at Pet Assure's call center are instructed
to take notes when customers complain, compliment or make any
comment about the competition. The information is forwarded
directly to Bloom, who distributes it to sales, marketing and other
departments.
Some customers of competitive plans come from an unlikely
source: the ranks of Bloom's employees. "A great way to
find out what's going on with competitors is to have staff
enroll in their programs," he explains. Competitive shopping,
as the practice is known, offers deep insight about rivals'
offerings, marketing, pricing and service.
One Pet Assure employee who signed with a competitor found the
company was automatically enrolling anyone who called a phone
number and tacking the fee onto the customer's monthly phone
bill. Learning about the objectionable practice alerted Bloom to an
opportunity for stressing his own more ethical billing methods to
prospects in the competitor's market.
Pet Assure's financial backers are also naturally interested
in competitive trends, and they provide another backstop. Not long
ago, an investor noticed a rival's ads suddenly increasing in
number and frequency and tipped Bloom off to the potential threat.
Bloom found the competitor had formed a strategic partnership to
get the cash for its invigorated marketing effort. Bloom used the
information to form his own partnership with a rival of his
competitor's new ally. "We have over 100 investors,"
he says, "and they call me every time they see anything on pet
insurance."
Perhaps Pet Assure's most valuable CI resource consists of
the 2,000 veterinarians enlisted to care for members' pets.
When rival firms contact a Pet Assure-affiliated vet, the vet
usually calls Bloom to discuss the offer. Sometimes Bloom even gets
to peek at rivals' contracts. "We get a ton of information
from our provider network," Bloom says. "There's no
other way to find out about the small, regional players."
Bloom uses his CI findings in a variety of ways. When a customer
call alerted him to the fact that a competitor was the target of a
consumer lawsuit in a nearby state, Bloom moved quickly to run down
details. "That kind of information about a competitor has a
lot of value, especially when you're bidding against
them," Bloom says.
A major concern is trying to find out whether a pet insurer is
moving into Bloom's favorite markets: employee benefit
programs, retail pet stores and banks, which offer memberships as
inducements to credit-card customers. "We want to know what
our competitors are doing, what their products are like and what
their offers are," Bloom says.
Lately, Pet Assure has looked into acquiring some smaller
competitors, and CI plays a key role by letting Bloom evaluate
acquisition candidates without tipping his hand. "The
monitoring lets us form opinions on who's worth pursuing a
relationship with and who's not going anywhere," he
says.
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