Competitive intelligence reporting is a pain. Manual tracking, endless screenshots, and a dozen browser tabs open just to keep up with your competitors’ moves. If you’re tired of spreadsheet chaos and want to actually use the intel you collect, you’re in the right place. This guide is for marketers, product managers, and anyone who needs reliable, up-to-date competitive insights—without chasing their tail every week.
Crayon is a platform built for competitive intelligence, and its workflows promise to automate the grunt work. But does it really save you from the reporting slog? Let’s separate the helpful from the hype and walk through exactly how to set up automated CI reporting that works in the real world.
1. Know What to Automate (And What Not To)
Before you even log in to Crayon, get clear about what you actually need. Automation is great for the repetitive stuff—but it won’t (and shouldn’t) replace human judgment.
What’s worth automating: - Collecting public competitor updates (news, blog posts, pricing pages) - Tracking product changes, new features, or messaging shifts - Pushing regular digests or alerts to key stakeholders
What still needs a human: - Context: “Is this feature actually a big deal?” - Analysis: “What should we do about this?” - Filtering signal from noise
Pro tip: Don’t try to automate your strategy. Use workflows to free up your time for thinking, not just gathering data.
2. Set Up Your Crayon Account and Sources
Crayon’s strength is in pulling in data from a ton of sources and organizing it for you. But it’s only as good as what you feed it.
a. Collect Your List of Competitors
- Be honest: who actually matters to your business right now?
- Don’t track the whole market “just in case.” Pick 3-5 key rivals to start.
b. Pick the Right Sources
Crayon can monitor: - Websites (home pages, pricing, blogs, docs) - Social media (LinkedIn, Twitter) - Press releases and news - Review sites (G2, TrustRadius) - Job boards and hiring pages
Skip the sources nobody on your team cares about. More isn’t better—relevance is.
c. Connect the Sources
- In Crayon, add your competitors and their web properties.
- Plug in social handles, RSS feeds, and any other public URLs.
- Use the preview or test features to make sure Crayon is actually pulling the right content. It’s surprisingly easy to track the wrong page by accident.
3. Build Your First Automated Workflow
Now for the good stuff: setting up the workflow that’ll handle reporting for you.
a. Choose a Workflow Template (Or Start from Scratch)
Crayon offers workflow templates for things like: - Weekly competitive digests - Real-time alerts for major changes - Monthly executive summaries
If you’re new, start with a digest. You can always tweak or layer in real-time alerts later.
b. Define Triggers and Filters
- Triggers: What counts as “newsworthy”? You can trigger on website changes, new blog posts, pricing updates, or even new job listings.
- Filters: This is crucial. Don’t let every social post or press release hit your Slack channel. Filter by keywords, competitor, or type of change.
Pro tip: Over-alerting is the fastest way to get ignored. Start with broad filters, then tighten them as you see what’s noise.
c. Choose Recipients and Channels
- Who actually needs to see these reports? Sales, execs, product, or just you?
- Crayon supports email, Slack, Teams, and in-app notifications.
- Keep it simple: Too many channels = chaos. Pick the ones your team actually uses.
d. Set Up the Report Format
- Do you want a summary, detailed list, or just high-level highlights?
- Tweak the template—add or remove sections, reorder info, or add your own quick notes.
- Consider a “What this means” section, even if it’s just a prompt for you to add commentary.
4. Test and Tweak Your Workflow
Don’t assume it’s perfect out of the gate. Run your workflow for a week or two and see what happens.
a. Watch for False Positives (and Misses)
- Are you getting flooded with minor updates? Time to tighten filters.
- Are you missing important events? Loosen filters or add new sources.
- Ask teammates for feedback: “Are you reading these reports? What’s actually useful?”
b. Adjust Timing and Frequency
- Weekly works for most teams. Real-time alerts can be overkill unless you’re in a hyper-competitive market.
- If people aren’t reading, try changing when the report lands (Monday AM vs. Friday PM makes a difference).
c. Keep Stakeholders in the Loop
- Let people know what’s automated vs. what’s curated.
- Make it clear that the report is a starting point, not the final word.
5. Add Human Context—Don’t Just Forward Data
Automation gets you the raw material, but interpretation is what makes CI valuable. Here’s how to add value without turning reporting into a second job:
- Skim the automated report before it goes out. Add quick notes or highlights.
- Flag anything truly urgent or unusual with a simple “Pay attention to this” callout.
- If you spot a trend (“Competitor X keeps hiring for product managers in Europe…”), add a one-liner about what it could mean.
Honestly, even a 2-minute review makes a huge difference. Otherwise, you’re just forwarding noise.
6. Keep Improving Your Workflow
Competitive landscapes change. So should your workflow.
- Review your sources and filters every couple of months.
- Prune anything that’s turned into spam.
- Add new competitors or sources as your market shifts.
- When something big slips through, figure out why—then adjust.
Ignore the hype: There’s no “set it and forget it” in competitive intelligence. But automating the boring stuff means you can spend more time on what matters.
What Works, What Doesn’t, and What to Ignore
What works: - Automating the collection and first-pass sorting of data - Pushing the right info to the right people, on their turf (Slack, email, etc.) - Using automation as a starting point for actual analysis
What doesn’t: - Trying to automate judgment, strategy, or nuanced recommendations - Overloading people with every tiny update (“Competitor changed a button color!”) - Ignoring feedback from your audience (if nobody’s reading, you’ve missed the point)
Ignore: - Fancy dashboards nobody uses - “AI-powered insights” that are just regurgitated headlines - Tracking every competitor in your industry “just in case”
Wrap-Up: Keep It Simple, Iterate Often
Automating your competitive intelligence reporting with Crayon isn’t about replacing your brain—it’s about getting the grunt work out of the way. Start small, focus on what actually helps your team, and don’t be afraid to cut features or sources that aren’t pulling their weight.
You won’t get it perfect the first time. That’s fine. The best CI workflows are the ones you actually use, tweak, and improve over time. Stay skeptical of magic-bullet promises, and use automation to give yourself (and your team) more time to think, not just react.