Because a dusty PDF in Notion doesn’t close deals.
Yes, I mean those battlecards.
The ones you spent days and nights writing, refining, and making sure they used the latest brand template.
They are packed with details, graphs, and buried in a SharePoint folder called “Competitor Benchmark > FY2022 update > Battlecards”
Yet, you don’t want to think about them because no one reads them.
Why? because salespeople think your cards are useless. But no worries, we all made the same mistake the first time!
So how do we make battlecards salespeople actually use?
A battlecard isn’t a reference document. It’s a weapon. If it doesn’t help your rep handle a competitor mention in the moment, it’s just more noise.
So let’s change that. Let’s build battlecards that earn a spot on people’s minds and browser bookmarks!
Here’s the thing: building a good battlecard is a product design problem.
Salespeople are the users.
Their use case is countering objections from prospects.
Your job is to make that easy.
A few design principles to keep in mind:
Sound familiar? Yep. That’s product thinking. Apply it here.
Before you start typing, here’s a cheat code. Walk over to a rep you trust (or ping them on Slack) and ask:
“Hey, what's a competitor do you love hearing about in deals?”
They’ll light up. “Salesforce? Oh man, I love when prospects mention Salesforce.”
Why? Ask what they say when that happens.
“Haha, I just show them a screenshot, it's a complete mess. We laugh, and I move on.”
Right there, you’ve got your Quick Dismiss: a simple and effective way to eliminate a competitor and continue the sales conversation.
When a competitor comes up in a deal, salespeople generally pick one of two approaches.
Sometimes, a competitor mention is just a throwaway: “We’re also looking at ACME.”
Perfect. This is your cue for a short and effective argument that explains why this competitor is not a good fit for your ICP. (you know who’s your ICP, right? right?)
It could be a deal-breaker flaw (“their reporting is limited to CSV exports unless you upgrade”), or an obvious mismatch (“they’re built for startups, you’re at 1,000+ seats”).
The goal? Shut it down and move on.
When the competitor is a serious contender, the Quick Dismiss is not enough to convince. Even worse, it is very likely to backfire, as it will be perceived as an attempt by the salesperson to deceive the buyer.
In those cases, you need to go full Obi-Wan.
Instead of going head-to-head, the idea is to guide the prospect, so they convince themselves that there’s a mismatch between their needs and the competing product, and that your product is a better fit for them.
By asking strategic questions on the prospect’s needs and context, the salesperson steers the conversation towards areas where your product is a better fit for them.
Then, when they answer, reframe:
“Got it. I understand why you are considering Hubspot as well. But they price those features as Add-ons, and users complain that they hit paywalls constantly. Our Pro solution includes all that. With Hubspot, you are looking at $4,000 for add-ons alone.”
It's not arguing. It's helping the prospect make the right decision and positioning themselves as a trusted adviser rather than a pushy salesperson.
Your battlecard should include both approaches.
None of this works if your info is stale.
Your reps need real-time awareness: What’s the competitor shipping this quarter? How do we win deals against them? What features do we miss?
This is where tools like PeerPanda (yep, that’s us) come in handy. We keep your competitive insights updated automatically: product changes, pricing shifts, new positioning... Try us!
Get fresh competitive insights with PeerPanda
Get Started for freeReady to build? Here’s a simple blueprint you can steal and adapt. Keep it modular, mix and match depending on what’s important for your industry.
Size, positioning, funding stage - just enough to avoid an embarrassing blunder.
“US-Based, Mid-market, Series B, 200 employees, trying to move upstream but still heavily SMB.”
One-liner to kill the conversation fast.
“Their solution is usually more than 20k/year and they usually don’t talk to companies with less than $20M/year annual revenue”
Areas, features, conversation topics that salespeople can move the conversation into.
“They do support that but only on their enterprise tier.”
“They have integrated AI insights light year, but it’s like a ChatGPT tacked on their legacy product. It can only answer basic questions and they have a very hard time selling that add-on.”
Topics to tread lightly on, or signals the prospect isn’t your ICP.
They communicated on our data breach last year. They had a much worse one in 2021, and they were fined for that. We choose not to communicate at the time because that’s not how we do business.
Real customers who made the switch. Everyone loves a good story.
“This customer worked with us for 5 years, they eventually switched to ACME to save money. It ended up costing way more because their X, Y features were so bad, and it missed feature Z. They eventually came back a few months later”
Phrases or feature names that help you detect what other competitors the buyer is evaluating, if you are in a sensitive industry like cybersecurity.
Prospect mentions “SmartInventory”
The real test of a battlecard? Whether a rep pulls it up on a Friday at 4pm before a cold call session.
If it helps then, you’ve nailed it. If it’s static, outdated, or requires Ctrl+F to be useful… it’s just a waste of your time.
So build for the moment. Keep it short, smart, and scrappy.
PS: If your reps still aren’t using the battlecards after this, don’t write more. Just ask them why.
A sales battlecard is a short, tactical reference sheet that helps sales reps handle competitor mentions in live conversations. It usually includes quick comparisons, objection-handling tactics, and real win stories.
Think of it as a cheat sheet for competitive selling: fast, focused, and always at the ready.
Because they’re too long, too detailed, or just hard to find.
Sales reps don’t have time to dig through five-slide decks or Notion databases mid-call. If the card doesn’t help in the moment, it’s not helpful at all.
A solid battlecard should include a quick dismiss argument for casual competitor mentions, key questions to guide deeper conversations, cues to help reps spot the competitor in the wild, clear points on how to win the deal, pitfalls to avoid that could lead to a loss, and one or two real win stories to add credibility and confidence.
It’s when a competitor is mentioned casually, and the rep responds with a short, effective reason to move on. No deep comparison, no long-winded explanation. It neutralizes the threat and shifts the focus back to your product.
Battlecards should be updated every month at least.
Competitors ship changes, tweak pricing, and evolve positioning all the time. Outdated battlecards do more harm than good. Ideally, review them monthly or use a tool that updates them automatically as new intel comes in.
Only if it’s relevant and won’t change too often. If the competitor has a pricing gotcha (like key features locked behind expensive tiers), highlight it. But don’t get obsessed with pricing tables: they go stale quickly and can derail the conversation.