Competitive Positioning Tool from the #1 Market Research Agency in the US
See exactly where your brand can differentiate
SmokeLadder gives marketers and agencies positioning scores, category benchmarks, and proprietary AI insights for any brand and its competitors so you can uncover a unique space to own in the market.
3MM+
Proprietary data points including scores and insights
15K+
Competitor brand reports you can access instantly
360°
View of positioning, features, messaging, and categories
Get a complete view of any brand
Find new space to own
Run a differentiation analysis to surface competitive gaps, key strengths to double down on, and areas to avoid – so you know where and how the brand can stand apart.
Spot opportunities that competitors miss
“Feels like I have a whole team of researchers and microstrategists.”
“It’s uncovering ideas and insights I may not have otherwise had. When I onboard a client I feel like I’m reading their minds – they ask me how did I know that?”
Scott Martin
Founder, Brand Strategist
Purpose built to help strategists and marketers navigate a new era of competitive noise and uncover ways to stand out.
Proprietary data, benchmarks, and frameworks you can’t get using generic LLMs
Discover new places to differentiate
Sharpen key messaging
Use the Message Clarity analysis to find issues, then generate new messaging ideas based on the brand’s positioning, category, and key persona.
Get a full strategic view
See in-depth breakdowns of any brand’s target persona, key strengths, competitors, SWOT analysis, and more – plus action items on how you can use the insights.
Automatic Email Reports
Fresh insights in your inbox
Stay up to date on all the brands you’re working on with automatic email reports that show changes to your scores – and to key competitors.
Evaluate visual impact
Peek inside the competition
Easy pricing plans
Free Account
- Run a strategy analysis on any brand
- Get 10 free analysis actions to try out all of SmokeLadder’s functionality
- Sign up for free (no credit card required)!
Pay As You Go
- Pay for credits as you go – No recurring costs
- Choose your usage: 25 ($19), 75 ($49), 150 ($79)
- Analysis of client brands and their competitors
- Differentiation reports
- Bi-Weekly email reports
- Full strategy briefs
- Persona and SWOT analysis
- Brand visuals analysis
- Messaging clarity analysis
- Copywriting generation and editing
- Brand value assessment
- Competitive differentiation
- Category analysis
- Value prop analysis
- Decision maker insights
- PDF downloads
- Access to our full database of thousands of brands
Premium Account
- Unlimited analysis actions (with fair use)
- Analysis of client brands and their competitors
- Differentiation reports
- Bi-Weekly email reports
- Full strategy briefs
- Persona and SWOT analysis
- Brand visuals analysis
- Messaging clarity analysis
- Copywriting generation and editing
- Brand value assessment
- Competitive differentiation
- Category analysis
- Value prop analysis
- Decision maker insights
- PDF downloads
- Access to our full database of thousands of brands
- Sign up for annual – save 30% (over 3 months free)
FAQs
Some of the questions we’ve heard from SmokeLadder customers that could be helpful to know as you explore the platform!
Is SmokeLadder only for agencies and consultants?
Nope, all types of strategists and marketers can get value from SmokeLadder. Internal marketing teams can use SmokeLadder to analyze their own brand and stay up to date on the strategy, positioning, and messaging of key competitors.
We focus on agencies and consultants because they have to analyze new brands and competitors constantly, so the level and frequency of need is often a lot higher.
Is it mainly for strategists and marketers or can sales teams use it too?
Sales teams get a huge amount of value from SmokeLadder. Having clear insights on a brand’s positioning. target customers, key competitors, and biggest points of value are all critical when talking with new clients. It’s like getting access to their internal strategy before you’ve even spoken with them.
How can we share the analysis with our team or clients?
Once you’ve created a brand brief (or accessed one for a brand we’ve already analyzed) you can share it via link or if you have a premium account you can download a PDF of the brief to share as well.
What kind of commitment is it to use SmokeLadder?
Premium subscriptions are all month-to-month, so no long term commitment is required. Of course you can sign up for an annual subscription to save money.
And you can test out all of the functionality for free (no CC required) to start.
Does SmokeLadder only analyze a brand's website?
The primary focus is on the brand’s website because this is the purest, most up to date communication of their strategy, positioning, and messaging.
That being said, the AI does reference other supporting brand elements to help inform parts of the analysis though it varies based on the individual brand.
Ultimately our goal is to deliver the most accurate analysis and insights about the brand.
What other analysis does SmokeLadder do?
In addition to any data we gather via AI, the platform performs internal analysis using our own proprietary systems and scoring to create things like our Total Positioning Score.
These processes are based on 10+ years of strategy consulting work across hundreds of clients in a variety of industries.
When you perform a brand analysis is the data current?
Yes, via API we’re able to look at the most up to date info and content for brands. Our only limitation is whatever is currently accessible via normal web search access – i.e. if search engines have discovered the changes for a brand so can SmokeLadder.
Note that we do update analysis on brands regularly to ensure they stay current.
Why is this better than running a brand analysis on ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, etc.?
There are many advantages to using SmokeLadder over a general AI chat product – here are the top 3:
- Rich Contextual Data: We don’t just deliver you analysis about a brand in isolation. Our system leverages over a million quantitative and qualitative data points that we’ve collected to help inform grades across value, differentiation, messaging, and competitive advantages. This means you get results built on multiple layers of information – and you get access to competitive benchmarks that aren’t available anywhere else.
- Expertise: We use a full set of proprietary analysis and scoring systems on the platform based on 10+ years of strategy consulting work to inform our outputs. Instead of using an ad hoc collection of prompts each time, you’re able to use a system that’s been fine-tuned (and continuously evolving) specifically for brand strategy, positioning, visual, and messaging analysis.
- Presentation: You get the analysis in a visual layout with scores, charts, and graphs all designed to make the data more accessible and make it easier to find strategic opportunities. It’s also easier to share this info with clients in a friendly, elevated way that allows you to have strategic discussions with them. It’s the same reason you would use a product like Quickbooks instead of a basic spreadsheet.
Our latest brand data & articles
Welcome to the Category Flood: Why Differentiation Has Never Been Harder
Category Flood is a condition in which a category is filled with so many brands competing around the same points of value that buyers can’t meaningfully distinguish one from another.
Differentiation has always been a core challenge in marketing. But the era we’re in now has hit a new level of crisis.
Best brand positioning and messaging software and tools
Positioning and messaging software is a new niche category. This guide helps tease apart products in this space to help you find the best solution to support your positioning and messaging work.
