Digital health is among the most crowded and fast-moving markets, with new entrants, pivots, funding events, and repositioning occurring constantly. Most teams monitor competitors ad hoc, then get surprised in deals they should have won. Competitive intelligence turns that disorder into decisions – stronger positioning, better sales, smarter roadmap. We build the CI function that keeps you ahead rather than reacting.
The Challenge
You lose deals because of competitor claims your sales team has never encountered before
In a fast-moving field, competitors constantly update their pitch, add capabilities, and reframe their category, and your sales team walks into deals unarmed against the newest version of the story. Reps improvise responses to competitor claims they encounter for the first time in the room, and lose winnable deals as a result. Without current, structured battlecards, sales is always a step behind. In digital health the pace of change makes this gap wider than in slower markets.
You are overwhelmed by competitor noise with no way to separate signal from PR
The category generates a constant stream of funding announcements, feature launches, and press, and most of it is noise that does not affect your strategy. Teams either ignore it all or chase every headline, and both are wrong. The hard part is filtering the movements that actually matter – a real repositioning, a pricing shift, a genuine capability – from the marketing theater. Without a system to separate signal from noise, competitive tracking becomes either paralysis or panic.
Your competitive intel sits in someone's head and never reaches the decisions it should shape
Even when someone on the team knows the competitive landscape well, that knowledge rarely gets structured, shared, or connected to the decisions it should drive – positioning, pricing, roadmap, sales enablement. Intelligence that stays in one person's head or a stale slide deck changes nothing. The value of CI is in the decisions it improves, and most digital health teams have no mechanism to route intelligence to those decisions. Knowing is not the same as acting.
You are monitoring the obvious competitors while missing adjacent players preparing to enter your space
Digital health boundaries are blurry, and the threat that reshapes your market often comes from an adjacent category, a big-tech entrant, or a payer building in-house rather than the direct competitors you watch. Teams fixated on named rivals get blindsided by moves from outside their frame. Real competitive intelligence maps the adjacent and emerging threats, not just the familiar logos. In this category, the disruptive entrant rarely announces itself as a competitor first.
How We Help
We begin by defining the competitive frame that truly matters to your business. This means mapping not only direct competitors but also adjacent categories, potential big-tech entrants, and in-house builds that could reshape your market, then determining which movements are worth monitoring. Companies get blindsided when the frame is drawn too narrowly, so we define it deliberately from day one.
Next, we create the intelligence system that distinguishes signal from noise. We determine what to monitor, how to filter the steady flow of funding, feature, and PR noise into the movements that affect your strategy, and how to keep everything current in a fast-moving field. The goal is a sustainable system that highlights the few things that matter, rather than a firehose nobody reads.
Then we transform intelligence into assets that support decisions. We create current sales battlecards, competitive positioning input for marketing, and landscape analysis for roadmap and pricing decisions – each linked to a specific decision it strengthens. Intelligence is wasted if it never reaches a decision, so every output is designed for use, not storage.
Operationally, we manage CI as an ongoing function instead of a one-time report. We update battlecards and the landscape as competitors move, provide timely alerts about meaningful developments, and connect the intelligence to your sales, marketing, and product teams on a regular rhythm. In a market moving this quickly, a static competitive report is outdated the week it ships, so we run it live.
For measurement, we monitor competitive win rates, sales confidence against known competitors, and how often CI influenced an actual positioning, pricing, or roadmap decision – not the number of reports. We evaluate the function by whether it improves the decisions and deals it was created to inform.
What sets us apart is that we operate competitive intelligence as an embedded function tied to sales, marketing, and product decisions, rather than as a research deck. Keeping ahead in a crowded, rapidly changing digital health market means converting constant change into current, decision-ready intelligence, and that is where we work.
What we deliver
- Competitive frame mapping direct, adjacent, and emerging threats – including big-tech and in-house builds
- Signal-from-noise monitoring system tuned to the movements that actually affect your strategy
- Decision-ready assets – current sales battlecards, positioning input, and roadmap and pricing landscape analysis
- Ongoing CI operation – live battlecard upkeep, timely alerts, and a rhythm feeding sales, marketing, and product
- Impact measurement – competitive win rates, sales confidence, and decisions actually shaped by CI
In digital health, the competitor that captures your market often was not on your competitive slide – it was an adjacent player, a big-tech entrant, or a payer building in-house. Monitoring named rivals may feel like competitive intelligence, but the real threat tends to emerge from the blind spot.
Our Methodology
We deliver competitive intelligence through a 90-day sprint that establishes an ongoing function. The first 30 days focus on framing and system design: we map the direct, adjacent, and emerging competitive frame and create the monitoring system that separates signal from noise. Days 30 through 60 focus on asset build: we develop the first battlecards, positioning input, and landscape analysis, with each linked to a decision. Days 60 through 90 shift to operation: we run the function live, maintain current assets, and connect intelligence to sales, marketing, and product on a rhythm.
Rather than acting like a research firm that delivers a one-time landscape deck, we operate CI as a live function because static reports become stale within weeks in this market. We define the competitive frame to capture adjacent and emerging threats that typically create surprises, direct intelligence to the specific decisions it should strengthen, and measure the function by win rates and decisions influenced instead of research volume. The function extends far beyond the initial sprint because the market keeps moving.
Our Approach
The first 30 days focus on framing and system design. We map the direct, adjacent, and emerging competitive frame, then create the monitoring system that filters out noise. You receive a candid view of your competitive blind spots and the movements that genuinely matter to your strategy.
Days 30 through 60 focus on building assets. We develop the first sales battlecards, positioning input, and roadmap and pricing landscape analysis, each tied to a specific decision. From your team, we need sales insight into the deals you are losing, engagement from product and marketing, and access to win-loss data.
Days 60 through 90 transition into live operation. We update assets as competitors move, deliver timely alerts, and connect intelligence to your sales, marketing, and product teams on a rhythm while tracking competitive win rates against a baseline. Since the market changes constantly, CI remains an ongoing function well beyond the first sprint, with a typical initial build lasting three to six months.
Our cadence includes a weekly working session with your sales, marketing, and product leads, along with alerts as material competitive movements occur. We work within your existing revenue and product rhythm so CI strengthens live decisions instead of becoming a research artifact.
- Higher competitive win rates in contested deals
- Sales confidence against current competitor claims
- CI-informed positioning, pricing, and roadmap decisions
- Early warning on adjacent and emerging threats
If your digital health company needs competitive intelligence leadership, we should talk.
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Frequently asked questions
What does competitive intelligence cost for a digital health company?
We price CI at a fixed monthly fee based on the breadth of the competitive frame, the depth of assets needed, and the cadence of ongoing operation. A crowded market with numerous adjacent and emerging threats requires more monitoring than a narrow market, and we define that scope up front.
How soon will we see results from a competitive intelligence engagement?
The competitive frame, monitoring system, and initial battlecards are established during the first 90 days, and sales typically sees the benefit once current battlecards reach the field. The impact on win rates grows as the function remains current and influences more decisions over time.
How does the competitive intelligence team work with our existing staff?
We embed within your sales, marketing, and product teams because CI creates value only when it informs the decisions those teams make. We require sales input on lost deals, product and marketing engagement, and access to win-loss data. We hold a weekly working session and integrate alerts and current assets into your existing revenue and product rhythm instead of delivering a standalone deck.
How is Winston Francois different from a traditional market research firm?
A market research firm provides a one-time landscape report that becomes stale within weeks in this market. We operate CI as a live function, define the competitive frame to include adjacent and emerging threats that create the biggest surprises, and direct intelligence to the specific sales, marketing, and product decisions it should strengthen. Our performance is measured by win rates and decisions influenced, not research volume.
How is ROI measured for a competitive intelligence engagement?
We measure competitive win rates in contested deals, sales confidence against known competitors, and how frequently CI influenced a real positioning, pricing, or roadmap decision, all relative to your baseline. Report volume is omitted because output does not equal outcome. We judge the function on whether it strengthens the deals and decisions it was designed to inform, and whether it provides early warning of threats that might otherwise blindside you.
Which type of digital health company is the right fit for this service?
This service is designed for digital health companies roughly in the 5M to 100M ARR range operating in a crowded, fast-moving segment where competitors shift constantly and deals are contested. It works best when sales, marketing, and product teams will use the intelligence and share win-loss data. CI is less important if you operate in a slow, uncontested niche. We begin with a strategy call and a review of your competitive landscape and recent losses.
