The one platform to end all platforms?

With the proliferation of Competitive Intelligence (CI) platforms resembling the national debt (i.e., multiplying at scary speed), I get at least one promotional message a week about a new platform that promises “intelligence”, “analysis” and “insight” and “cutting through the noise” (which of course they only add to). The latest came from India and promised competitor insights with an example of a project commissioned by a pharmaceutical client, tracking side effects for a migraine drug.

I got a migraine from all these platforms. I should take something, but I am worried now about side effects.

But then one platform comes around, and it is promising. It’s not a “CI” platform at all. And yet it is the best CI platform.

It’s not a “Competitive Intelligence” platform at all. And yet it is the best Competitive Intelligence platform.

It’s called Gong. Read about it here and here.

The sound of Gong

The idea behind Gong is that CRM doesn’t work as well as one hope. In the words of its founder, Amit Ben-Dov:

 “CRM systems make very poor systems of engagement. While they contain a wealth of information for business leadership, getting staff to put information into them or utilize the information that’s in them is an ongoing battle.”

In 1988, when I co-authored the first-ever book to propose organizing a systematic intelligence process, our advice to companies was to create an internal network, and first and foremost try and get salespeople to contribute. The book sold out, started my career, and was adopted by all the Fortune 500s.

The advice about salespeople, though, was crap.

Salespeople just didn’t contribute anything despite all incentive schemes and top management urging. You could twist their arms, hold a gun to their head, but they still had no time for competitive intelligence reporting and hardly paid attention to the CI professional (let alone the HQ marketers). 

Michael Shea, one of my brightest CIPs?, worked with salespeople all his career. His method was to get personally involved with them, gather data across them, extract competitive insights that each individually didn’t have and get back to them with that. That requires the impossible rare combination of both social skills (talking to salespeople? Lord help me) and big picture perspective.

Now Gong can do that without using undue force.

What’s so unique about Gong?

Real intelligence

Gong is valued at $7.2 billion, and is backed by heavy weight investors. These things can be ephemeral. Gong can still become an episode if it follows other fading unicorns who hang on Gartner’s every word. But its concept is pure gold and the fact that it hasn’t gone on a shopping spree suggests rare discipline.

The main selling point and competitive advantage of Gong is that unlike other data platforms it actually reduces noise.

The main selling point and competitive advantage of Gong is that unlike other data platforms it actually reduces noise.

Gong pioneered a new space called Revenue Intelligence. The difference between intelligence and data, more data, and even more data is what one does with all that data. To judge by the comments from participants in our training, the answer is: very little. To judge by comments from one participant from a Fortune 500 in my most recent Blindspot course on June 4th, Gong is different. It works.

Unlike CRM which collects tons of data about existing customers, improves “relationships” with them, and reduces the cost of sales, or so called “competitive intelligence” platforms that collect tons of more data about competitors, products and markets, Gong’s focuses on options to increase revenues. Gong does it by automating the capture of, and finding patterns in, all conversations between salespeople and existing or prospective customers in the B2B space. In the process it flags competitive findings glanced from the prospect-salesperson conversation. All data are funneled into opportunities for more sales.

In other words, it’s not more data, it’s less data. And it’s like having an army of collectors at your fingertips. 

It’s like having an army of collectors at your fingertips. 

The sound of Gong is music to my ears.

Why is it more intelligence than other data-based, AI-augmented, ML-infused platforms that find “patterns” in data? Because primary intelligence from salespeople is the best source for early signs of change long before WSJ reports on that or Google search shows them, yet no one can tap them without risking one’s life. Until now. 

Since strategy is not about chasing competitors but identifying early sign of opportunities to staying ahead, Gong it is.

Primary intelligence from salespeople is the best source for early signs of change.

Ben-Dov and his cofounder- Eilon Reshef – identified pain points for salespeople and these weren’t about too little information. What was missing was a filter that generated specific opportunities.

Sales reps don't have too little information. They suffer from too much noise.

This is fodder for competitive intelligence on a strategic level. One doesn’t need 175 Zettabyte of information about every burp by a competitor to stay ahead, just alertness to early signals of opportunities.

Alternative perspective: Until now, I resisted the trend of other organizations in this field to bulk up their coffers with vendors’ sponsorships. But for the first time I am recommending a vendor you should look into (and no, I am not getting anything from it). The usefulness of the Gong platform to competition analysts is obvious. Gong’s insights can be used by competition analysts to add value to strategies at any level.

It’s my old Internal Network on steroids.

It's my old concept of an internal collection network on steroids. That’s also consistent with my message to our trainees to focus on opportunities rather than exclusively on risks. Leave the “threat warnings” to cyber security.

Management is always hungry for opportunities for growth. Not surprising, Marc Benioff, the godfather of CRM, invested in Gong. The guy knows intelligence when he sees it. Salesforce.com has one of the best CI teams I’ve ever trained. One of Gong’s early clients was Slack. Who now owns Slack? You guessed it: Saleforce.com.

I just hope Gong is using its software with its own salespeople. In the 90s, I ran a war game with an advanced analytics company who was competing in a new BI space against much more sophisticated big-league players and not doing that well with the business decision makers. Halfway through the game I asked them if they used their own software.

There was an embarrassed silence.  

Don’t go out with a bang, go out with a Gonggggggg.