Know what changed before it changes the conversation.
I watch the competitive environment, verify meaningful changes, understand their implications, and keep the company ready for the conversations those changes create.
- Watch. Keep the important competitors, substitutes, platforms, and market shifts visible.
- Detect. Distinguish a meaningful change from ordinary noise.
- Verify. Establish what changed and what has only been claimed.
- Interpret. Determine whether it changes the differentiation, objection handling, strategy, or nothing at all.
- Equip. Give the relevant people the context they need to respond.
- Learn. Use field and market response to improve the competitive model.
- Track change, not trivia.
- Verify before reacting.
- Compete on what matters to the buyer.
One example, from an independent study
From Ramp’s public launch of Router: Ramp itself names the alternative, “a routing layer alone.” That tells me where the competitive line sits. I would not try to out-shout other routers on cost; I would test competing on what a standalone router doesn’t connect to: the spend views a Ramp customer already uses. My analysis, from Ramp’s August 19, 2026 press release. See the study →
Why ignoring noise is part of the job
Most competitor movement never reaches a buyer. Treating every feature, hire, or announcement as a threat wastes the company's attention and pulls the roadmap around. The system exists to tell the difference, and to say so when a change does not matter.
How the team relationship works
Product decides the product response. Leadership decides the strategic response. PMM owns the market interpretation and commercial readiness: what the change means to buyers, and whether messaging, enablement, or positioning should move.
Modus Create · Founding PMM
At Modus, I identified the opportunity for Just Add+ Excalidraw through competitive research, then worked with Product and Engineering to help shape the product.
Read the case study