In today’s highly competitive business environment, understanding your competitors is key to building a successful marketing strategy. BigSpy is like a massive ad database, storing an enormous amount of creative ad data that helps us:
- Identify potential competitors in the market
- Deeply analyze known competitors’ advertising strategies
- Gain insights into industry trends
- Optimize our own ad placement strategies
The latest version of BigSpy not only expands data coverage but also enhances its analytical capabilities, making competitive intelligence gathering more efficient and precise.
BigSpy Covers Millions of Products and Websites Across Different Industries
BigSpy primarily focuses on three major sectors: e-commerce, gaming apps, and utility apps. It covers tens of millions of products and websites from various industries. Its broad coverage is thanks to two main strengths:
Integration with Major Ad Platforms:
BigSpy supports nine of the most popular online ad platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, Admob, YouTube, TikTok, Twitter, Pinterest, Yahoo, and Unity. These platforms represent the majority of online ad traffic and are go-to channels for advertisers. BigSpy’s integration allows users to access diverse and abundant advertising data.
Robust Data Crawling and Processing System:
With an efficient system that updates with tens of millions of ad creatives daily, users can stay up-to-date with the latest advertising trends and competitors’ activities.
These extensive data can help us gain richer and more comprehensive insights into competitors. Ready to dive in?If you already have a clear target in mind, feel free to jump straight into the Ad Pages section below to start exploring!Not quite sure who to focus on yet? No worries — just head to the Precise Targeting & In-Depth Analysis section below, where you'll find everything you need to identify the right competitors and uncover their strategies.
Use Ad Pages along with Precise Targeting & In-Depth Analysis to better uncover your competitors and explore their advertising strategies.
Identifying the right competitor is a crucial first step when trying to understand their ad creatives and strategies. After all, they represent the direction of your research — and with the right focus, your future searches will be more accurate and efficient.
If you’ve already identified your target competitors,Now, let’s jump right in and start exploring the Ad Pages feature!
Ad Pages Feature:
Discover the power of BigSpy's homepage analysis feature in just two simple steps. This tool is designed to help you effortlessly analyze your competitors' advertising strategies, enabling you to make your own ad campaigns more targeted and effective.
Step 1: Enter a Competitor’s Brand or Page Link
Using this feature is incredibly simple. Just enter the competitor’s brand name or paste the link to their Facebook page, Instagram account, or TikTok homepage into BigSpy’s search bar (e.g., type "Nike") and click the Search button.BigSpy will automatically fetch and analyze all ad data associated with that page. You can also filter the results by platform, ad duration, and basic criteria like country, industry, and runtime for more precise tracking.
On the results page, you’ll find data like Likes, Popularity, Ads, Top Country, Latest Ad, 90-Day Trend, and Promoted Products. This helps you evaluate the brand’s influence, understand user engagement, see how many ads are currently active, where they’re primarily running ads, the most recent ad launch date, and a clear 90-day advertising trend chart alongside the brand’s key promoted products.
Step 2: Click the Star Icon to Subscribe and Enter the Homepage
After completing your search, click the star icon to subscribe and access the competitor’s homepage. Here, you’ll uncover a wealth of valuable insights—such as Advertising Trend, AD Distribution, and Creatives Insight. These three data points give you valuable insights into your competitors, helping you craft smarter and more effective marketing strategies.
Advertising Trend: Understand Your Competitor’s Marketing Pulse
When you land on a competitor’s homepage, the first thing you’ll notice is the Advertising Trend module. This feature acts like a precise “marketing ECG,” giving you a clear view of your competitor’s advertising rhythm.
Time-based analysis is one of the most frequently used features. You can view ad volume changes over the past 30, 90, 180 days, or even an entire year. Just imagine—if you notice a competitor suddenly ramping up their ad spend by 50% on a Wednesday, it’s likely a signal: “Hey, we’re gearing up for a weekend promotion!”
The Seasonality Pattern feature is a hidden gem. BigSpy analyzes historical data to detect annual promotional peaks. For instance, if a beauty brand increases its ad volume every March, it’s probably preparing for Mother’s Day. Recognizing these trends helps you plan ahead and strike first.
Intensity Evaluation acts as a “marketing pressure gauge,” comparing recent ad activity to historical averages to assess how aggressively they’re currently marketing—often indicating new product launches or major promotions.
Promoted Pages: Decode Brand Matrix Strategies
This feature allows you to analyze associated subpages, revealing the full scope of your competitor’s brand matrix and multi-brand strategy.
Ad Distribution: Get the Full-Funnel Picture
The Ad Distribution module is like a wide-angle lens for your analysis, revealing your competitors’ overall marketing architecture.
Platform Distribution: Where is your competitor investing their ad spend? All-in on Facebook? Balanced between TikTok and Instagram? Platform choices usually reflect their audience targeting. Heavy TikTok spend typically means a younger audience, while lots of LinkedIn activity points to a B2B strategy.
Creatives Type Distribution: This reveals what types of creatives are performing well. A sudden shift from 30% to 70% video ads? Time to consider a strategy shift. More carousel ads? They’re likely pushing multiple SKUs. A surge in single-image ads could signal a breakout product.
Geographical Distribution: The heatmap gives you a visual breakdown of where they’re increasing investment or pulling back, offering key insights into international expansion strategies.
Creatives Insight: Dissect High-Converting Creatives
The Creatives Insight module is your creative war room—dig into what makes a top-performing ad.
Full Creative Archive: Think of it as your competitor’s personal ad museum. Scroll through their entire ad history, observe creative evolution, and identify “evergreen” creatives that have stood the test of time.
Copy Analysis: See a word cloud of high-frequency terms. Are they pushing “limited-time offer” promos or going with value-focused lines like “redefine”? Sentiment analysis reveals whether they’re appealing to logic or emotion.
Visual Style Analysis: Unpack their “visual language.” BigSpy identifies primary colors, typography, settings, and other key visual elements so you can distill what’s working in their design.
CTA Strategy Analysis: Focuses on call-to-action buttons. Are they leaning into direct conversions like “Buy Now” or soft CTAs like “Learn More”? Testing shows that different CTAs can have dramatically different conversion impacts.
Remember—competitive analysis isn’t about copying, it’s about outperforming. These three BigSpy modules are your “competitive radar,” helping you spot opportunities, dodge pitfalls, and take the lead. It won’t be long before you go from follower to frontrunner.
Now that you’ve learned how to use Ad Pages to specifically explore your competitors, let’s move on to the next step — discovering valuable insights even when you don’t have a clear target yet. With the help of the Precise Targeting & In-Depth Analysis section, you’ll uncover the content and competitors that truly matter to you.
Precise Targeting & In-Depth Analysis:
Three Key Methods for Precise Competitor Targeting
To sift through BigSpy’s vast data pool effectively, its powerful filtering functions are essential:
Keyword Search & Exclusion:
BigSpy supports keyword search, allowing users to find ads by entering relevant competitor keywords. It also allows the exclusion of certain keywords or known competitors to refine results.Example: Search “slimming” but exclude “apparel” to focus on non-fashion weight loss products.
Multi-Dimensional Filtering & Sorting:
After initial search, further sorting and filtering help refine the analysis:
Estimated Impressions: Discover high-exposure ads to spot market leaders.
Latest Creatives:By capturing newly launched ad creatives in real time during your selected time period, you can stay updated on industry trends and uncover innovative approaches from rising brands.
Last Seen: Understand if an ad is evergreen or a short-term test by checking the latest activity and duration.
Ad Duration: Identify high-converting creatives that have stood the test of time.
Related Ads: See how many versions a single advertiser runs across different channels to assess cross-platform strategy strength.
Popularity: Great for viral campaign inspiration—higher popularity indicates stronger competitiveness.
Likes: Measures “first glance appeal” and visual design preferences of audiences.
Cross-Analyzing Industry, Platform, Country, and Language
Hey folks, different industries require different platforms, and every country has its own set of competitors. Make the most of BigSpy’s cross-analysis features to track your competitors with ease and precision!
Preferred Platforms by Industry:
Let me help you better understand how to choose advertising platforms based on industry characteristics. These tips will surely make your competitor tracking and ad placement efforts much more effective!
If you’re in the e-commerce industry, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok are definitely your top choices for researching competitors. These visually-driven platforms create strong visual impact, which easily triggers impulse buying. TikTok, in particular, with its immersive short videos, can guide users seamlessly through the entire “want–buy” journey without them even realizing it.
Game and app developers, listen up! Platforms like TikTok with its playable ads, Unity Ads with in-game placements, and Applovin with reward-based ads are your battlegrounds—and also where your competitors are most active. These platforms allow users to experience exciting snippets of gameplay, encouraging them to download the app. This “try before you buy” model works especially well in our industry.
Geographic Targeting:
Filter ads by country or region to locate competitors active in specific target markets—essential for region-focused campaigns.
In-Depth Analysis of Competitors' Ad Creatives and Marketing Strategies
Once you've identified your competitors using BigSpy, you can dive deeper into analyzing their ad creatives and placement strategies. Start by clicking "View Advertiser Creatives" in the top right corner of any ad to filter all ads from a specific advertiser. This allows you to get a comprehensive view of their ad campaigns, break down their high-performing creatives and strategic logic, and in turn, optimize your own marketing efforts to uncover new growth opportunities.
Ad Trend Analysis: Understand Your Competitor’s Advertising Rhythm
Time-Based Analysis:Track how your competitor’s ad volume changes over the past 7, 30, or 90 days to gauge their marketing tempo.
For example, a surge in ad volume over the past 7 days might indicate a major promotion or a new product launch.
Ad Intensity Evaluation:
The more ads being run, the greater the promotional effort.Compare their volume to yours to assess whether your investment matches the competitive pressure in your industry.
Seasonal Strategy:
Analyze historical data to uncover seasonal patterns.
For instance, beauty brands may boost spending during holiday seasons (like Black Friday or Christmas), while travel products might see heavier promotion ahead of summer or winter vacations.
Creative Content Analysis: Learn the Secrets Behind Viral Ads
Preferred Ad Formats:
Do they lean towards videos, images, or carousel ads?
For example, TikTok e-commerce ads often use short videos, while B2B ads on Facebook might favor a mix of visuals and text.
Creative Themes:
Are their ads focused on promotions (e.g., limited-time offers), product showcases, or emotional storytelling (e.g., brand narratives)？Each strategy suits a different stage of the user journey.
Copywriting Tactics:
Analyze headline formulas (e.g., “50% Off for a Limited Time!”, “Only 100 Left!”) and CTAs (e.g., “Buy Now”, “Try for Free”).These small details can make a big difference in click-through rates!
Campaign Strategy Insights: Decode Their Market Deployment
Understand competitors’ primary markets through geographic distribution, evaluate their performance across different platforms through platform selection, and infer their target audience by reverse-analyzing the demographics based on ad placements.
Regional Focus:
Which markets are they targeting?
Some brands might run Facebook ads in Western markets and focus on TikTok for Southeast Asia.
Platform Preferences:
Do they prefer Facebook + Instagram, or TikTok + YouTube?
Each platform caters to different audiences and yields different results.
Audience Targeting:
Reverse-engineer their target demographics (e.g., young people, professionals, moms) based on where and how their ads are displayed.
In-Feed Ad Analysis: Learn from High-Engagement Campaigns
On platforms like Facebook, TikTok, Twitter, and YouTube, in-feed ads often deliver better conversions due to their native format and high interactivity.
With BigSpy’s original post filter, you can:
Understand content techniques – Study competitors’ video editing styles, subtitle use, background music, etc.
User engagement tactics – See how they drive comments, likes, and shares. Are they collaborating with influencers or KOLs?
Ad optimization signals – Which creatives run the longest? Which are replaced quickly? This helps identify what resonates best with the audience.
Perfect! You’ve now unlocked all the secrets to finding your competitors. So why wait? Strike while the iron’s hot — go give it a try!
In Conclusion
The advertising market is constantly changing. To maintain the effectiveness of your ads, you can conduct weekly competitor analysis to understand your rivals and optimize your advertising performance, staying ahead of market shifts.
Whether your competitors are e-commerce brands, gaming apps, or tool-based products, this analysis framework helps you:
Discover their ad strategy (what they run, how they run it, and to whom)
Optimize your ad spend (focus your budget on the most effective platforms and creatives)
Learn from successful campaigns (cut down trial-and-error costs and increase ad ROI)
Next time you plan an ad campaign, check out what your competitors are doing on BigSpy — you might just find the inspiration that doubles your ad performance!
Try the latest features of BigSpy now and start your journey into competitive intelligence!
