# Competitor Brief > Recurring competitor and market monitoring. Tracks a saved list of competitors, checks their sites and recent news each run, diffs against the last run, and reports only what materially changed — pricing, launches, funding, hiring, positioning. Use for "track competitors", "competitive intel", "what changed with ", managing the tracked list, or the weekly competitor brief. - Skill: `vellum-ai/competitor-brief` (Agent Skill, multi-file: 2 files) - Install (CLI): `npx skillmds@latest add vellum-ai/competitor-brief` - Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/vellum-ai/competitor-brief/raw - Safety review: pending - Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex - Category: Marketing & Growth - Author: vellum-ai (https://skillmd.com/u/vellum-ai) - Updated: 2026-09-17 - Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/vellum-ai/competitor-brief --- # Competitor Brief Keep a small, durable picture of each tracked competitor and surface **only what changed** since last time. The value is signal, not a re-scrape: a good brief is short, dated, and sourced. State lives in the `admin-copilot` plugin's storage and is read/written through the **`admin_copilot_prefs`** tool from the included `admin-copilot-prefs` skill, called via `skill_execute` — never edit files by hand: - The tracked list: `list_competitors`, `add_competitor`, `remove_competitor`. - Per-competitor last-run snapshots: `get_competitor_snapshot`, `save_competitor_snapshot`. > **If `skill_execute` reports `admin_copilot_prefs` as unknown or not > allowed,** the `admin-copilot-prefs` skill has not projected into this > session — the state actions will not become reachable by exploring, and > searching the filesystem for the storage files will not find them (the path > is internal). Try `skill_load` with `skill: "admin-copilot-prefs"` once; if > it still fails, do **not** loop or hand-write state. Stop and report one > line: "Competitor brief can't run yet — the admin-copilot state tool isn't > loading; restart the assistant to fix it." Do not fabricate a brief from > memory. ## When the user is curating the list - **Add:** `admin_copilot_prefs` `add_competitor` with `name` and, when known, `domain`, `watch_urls` (pricing / changelog / blog / careers pages worth checking), and `keywords` (topics to weight — e.g. "pricing", "enterprise", "funding"). - **Remove / list:** `remove_competitor` / `list_competitors`. - Confirm the resulting list back to the user. ## Producing a brief (per run) 1. **Load state.** `list_competitors`, and for each one `get_competitor_snapshot` to recall what you saw last time (sources + findings + `lastRunAt`). 2. **Gather current signal** for each competitor: - Fetch each `watch_url` with `web_fetch`; run a `web_search` for the competitor name plus its `keywords` and recent dates. - For a deeper periodic pass (e.g. monthly, or when the user asks for depth), escalate to the **deep-research** harness instead of light fetches. Keep the weekly run light and cheap. 3. **Cheap change pre-filter.** For each fetched page, hash the text and compare to the stored source hash to skip pages that did not change at all: ```bash # prints the sha256 of normalized stdin text echo "$PAGE_TEXT" | bun "$SKILL_DIR/scripts/page-hash.ts" ``` A matching hash means the page is byte-stable — skip deep analysis of it. A new or changed hash means read it closely. The hash is only a pre-filter; **you decide what is material.** 4. **Judge materiality.** Compare new signal against the prior findings. Surface only genuine changes: new/changed pricing, product launches or major changelog entries, funding or M&A, notable hiring (esp. leadership), and positioning/messaging shifts. Ignore cosmetic edits and re-phrasings. **Suggest a next move (don't take it).** A finding that just sits there is half the value. For each material finding, decide whether it warrants a concrete response — and if so, *prepare* it, never transmit it: - A competitor pricing or positioning shift sales should know → a **draft** note to the sales/team channel (e.g. a `slack` draft), handed over for the user to send. - A launch or capability worth a closer look → propose a deeper `deep-research` pass, or a calendar hold to dig in. - Something worth keeping in the user's own context → a one-line `remember`. Only attach an action when there's a real one; most findings are just signal. No action ever leaves the building on its own — every note is a draft the user sends, consistent with the no-send rule below. 5. **Write the new snapshot.** `save_competitor_snapshot` with the full object so next run can diff against it: ```json { "competitor": "Example Co", "lastRunAt": "", "sources": [ { "url": "https://example.com/pricing", "contentHash": "", "fetchedAt": "", "summary": "1-line state" } ], "findings": [ { "title": "Launched X tier", "detail": "...", "category": "launch", "sourceUrl": "https://...", "firstSeenAt": "" } ] } ``` Use the system clock for timestamps (`date -u +%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ`). 6. **Deliver the brief.** Group by competitor; lead with the most material item; one line each, every claim linked to its source. Where a finding earned a suggested move in step 4, append it on its own line as an offer the user can accept by name ("draft a heads-up to #sales", "dig into their new tier") — the prepared draft or proposal, never an action already taken. Respect the configured delivery channel (`admin_copilot_prefs` `get_prefs` → `competitorBrief.channel`): in-app means reply directly; for slack/email, hand off to the relevant channel (the `notifications` or messaging skill). ## Empty weeks If nothing material changed, **still report** — one line: "No material competitor changes this week (checked N competitors)." Silence reads as a broken job and erodes trust. Always save the refreshed snapshot even when findings are empty so hashes stay current. ## Rules - Only changes worth a busy person's attention. When in doubt, leave it out. - Every finding cites a source URL. No source, no finding. - This skill never sends email or messages on its own — delivery to slack/email goes through the dedicated channel skills, which carry their own confirmation. - Keep weekly runs cheap; reserve deep-research for explicit deep passes.