API Reference

Use Case: Competitive Audience Analysis

Business Challenge

Understanding your competitive landscape requires more than market share estimates and public information. True competitive intelligence comes from analyzing actual customer behavior patterns, audience overlap, and market positioning using real population movement data to identify opportunities for competitive advantage.

Common Scenarios:

  • Retailers analyzing competitor customer demographics and shopping patterns
  • Restaurants understanding dining preferences and cross-visitation with competitors
  • Media companies identifying advertiser prospects based on competitor audience analysis
  • Commercial real estate evaluating tenant mix effectiveness and optimization opportunities
  • Franchisors analyzing market penetration and competitive positioning for expansion planning

Required Inputs

  • Competitor Locations: Place IDs or addresses for competitor businesses
  • Your Locations: Place IDs for your own locations for comparison analysis
  • Market Boundaries: Geographic scope for competitive analysis (DMA, county, radius)
  • Analysis Timeframe: Current data period for behavior pattern analysis
  • Business Objectives: Specific competitive intelligence goals (market share, audience overlap, expansion opportunities)

API Workflow

Step 1: Discover Competitor Locations

Find and catalog competitor locations within your market area using Places search.

API Call: POST /msearch
→ API Documentation: Places API

{
    "filter": {
        "place_name": "coffee shop",
        "city": "Seattle",
        "state": "WA"
    },
    "pagination": {
        "page": 1,
        "page_size": 50
    },
    "sort": {
        "active": "place_name",
        "direction": "asc"
    }
}

Response Structure:

{
    "status": "success",
    "data": {
        "results": [
            {
                "place_id": "318105",
                "place_name": "Starbucks Coffee",
                "place_type_name": "Coffee Shop",
                "street_address": "123 Main Street",
                "city": "Seattle",
                "state": "WA",
                "zip_code": "98101",
                "dma_id": "819",
                "dma_name": "Seattle-Tacoma, WA",
                ...
            }
            ...
        ],
        "pagination": {
            "page": 1,
            "page_size": 50,
            "total_results": 127,
            "total_pages": 3
        }
    }
}

Location Analysis:

  • Geographic Distribution: Where competitors are positioned
  • Market Density: Competitive saturation by area
  • Site Selection Patterns: Competitor location strategies
  • Portfolio Mapping: Size and scope of competitor networks

Step 2: Analyze Competitor Audience Demographics

Understand who visits competitor locations and how their audience compares to yours.

API Call: POST /measures/placecast/report
→ API Documentation: Placecast Profiles

{
    "place_id": [318105, 318107, 318108]
}

Response Structure (competitor audience analysis):

{
    "places": [
        {
            "name": "Aggregated Competitor Locations",
            "place_id": [318105, 318107, 318108],
            "activities": 2127778,
            "visits": 1693268,
            "visits_unique_persons": 1169734,
            "visits_avg_dwell": 184,
            "visits_frequency_per_person": 1.45,
            ...
        }
    ],
    "place_count": 3,
    "segments": [
        {
            "type": "consumer",
            "category": "dining_preferences",
            "description": "Frequent coffee drinker",
            "id": "dining_003",
            "percent": 0.189,
            "index": 142,
            "motionworks_segment_id": "competitor-segment-123"
        }
        ...
    ],
    "county": [
        {
            "id": "53033",
            "description": "King County, WA",
            "weekly_visits": 425113,
            "daily_visits": 60730
        }
        ...
    ],
    "dma": [...],
    "postal_code": [...],
    ...
}

Competitive Intelligence:

  • Demographic Comparison: How competitor audiences differ from your customers
  • Market Positioning: Customer segments competitors are capturing (segments with high index scores)
  • Audience Quality: Engagement metrics like visits_avg_dwell and visits_frequency_per_person
  • Geographic Reach: Trade area analysis from county, dma, and postal_code arrays

Step 3: Analyze Your Own Location Performance

Get comparable audience data for your locations to establish performance benchmarks.

API Call: POST /measures/placecast/report
→ API Documentation: Placecast Profiles

{
    "place_id": [your_location_place_ids]
}

Performance Comparison Metrics:

  • Visitor Volume: Compare your visits and visits_unique_persons to competitors
  • Audience Composition: Analyze differences in segments profiles
  • Geographic Market Share: Compare county and dma visitor distributions
  • Engagement Quality: Benchmark visits_avg_dwell and repeat visitation patterns

Step 4: Identify Target Audience Segments

Find audience cohorts that represent competitive opportunities or threats.

API Call: POST /cohorts/search
→ API Documentation: Popcast API

{
    "motionworks_data_product_name": "Popcast At Home",
    "search_text": "coffee dining"
}

Response Structure:

{
    "cohorts": [
        {
            "motionworks_segment_id": "coffee-segment-456",
            "cohort_description": "Frequent coffee shop visitor past 30 days"
        }
        ...
    ]
}

Step 5: Map Competitive Audience Geography

Understand where your target audience and competitor audiences are concentrated.

API Call: POST /measures/popcast/at_home
→ API Documentation: Popcast API

{
    "motionworks_segment_id": "coffee-segment-456",
    "geography_type": ["DMA"]
}

Response Structure:

{
    "motionworks_segment_id": "coffee-segment-456",
    "geographic_type": ["DMA"],
    "customer_segment_name": "Frequent coffee shop visitor past 30 days",
    "year": 2022,
    "persons": 45200906,
    "all_persons": 333633487,
    "composition_percent": 0.13548072289278323,
    "results": [
        {
            "geography_id": "US2020XDMA819",
            "description": "Seattle-Tacoma, WA",
            "persons": 2450000,
            "all_persons": 19574000,
            "composition_index": 125,
            "composition_percent": 0.158,
            "geo_type": "DMA",
            "customer_segment_name": "Frequent coffee shop visitor past 30 days",
            "vintage": "20230909"
        }
        ...
    ],
    "ids": [...],
    "vintage": "20230909",
    "pagination": {...}
}

Strategic Analysis:

  • Market Concentration: Where target audience is most present (composition_index > 100)
  • Competitive Opportunity: Markets with high audience presence but low competitor penetration
  • Geographic Advantage: Areas where you have stronger presence than competitors
  • Expansion Potential: Markets showing audience demand but limited competition

Expected Outputs

Competitive Intelligence Report

  • Market Landscape: Comprehensive view of competitive positioning and market dynamics
  • Audience Analysis: Detailed comparison of customer demographics and behaviors
  • Performance Benchmarking: How your locations compare to competitor performance
  • Opportunity Mapping: Geographic and demographic growth opportunities

Strategic Recommendations

  • Competitive Positioning: How to differentiate and compete more effectively
  • Customer Acquisition: Strategies for capturing competitor customers
  • Market Expansion: Where and how to grow based on competitive analysis
  • Operational Optimization: Performance improvements based on competitive benchmarking

Tactical Intelligence

  • Marketing Strategy: Messaging and positioning to compete for shared audiences
  • Location Strategy: Site selection informed by competitive landscape analysis
  • Audience Targeting: Focus on demographics where competitors are weak
  • Partnership Opportunities: Complementary businesses serving similar audiences

Business Application

Competitive Strategy Development

Use population intelligence to inform strategic decisions and competitive positioning.

Strategic Framework:

  • Market Positioning: Define unique value proposition based on audience analysis
  • Competitive Advantages: Leverage strengths revealed through performance benchmarking
  • Market Entry: Enter new markets with data-driven competitive intelligence
  • Defense Strategy: Protect market share using competitor behavior insights

Customer Acquisition

Target competitor customers with precision based on actual behavior data.

Acquisition Strategies:

  • Audience Targeting: Focus marketing on demographics that visit competitors (segments data)
  • Geographic Targeting: Prioritize markets where competitors have strong presence
  • Message Development: Create communications that address competitor customer needs
  • Timing Optimization: Use competitor days and hourly patterns for optimal reach

Business Development

Identify partnership and expansion opportunities based on competitive landscape analysis.

Growth Applications:

  • Market Expansion: Enter markets where competitors demonstrate customer demand
  • Partnership Identification: Find businesses that serve complementary audience segments
  • Site Selection: Choose locations based on competitor performance and gaps
  • Investment Decisions: Validate expansion plans using competitive intelligence

Out-of-Home Advertising Applications

Analyze competitor billboard networks and identify strategic opportunities.

Strategic Applications:

  • Competitive Billboard Mapping: Identify competitor billboard locations and analyze their audience reach using visitor demographic data
  • Market Gap Analysis: Find high-traffic areas with strong demographic alignment but limited competitor billboard presence
  • Advertiser Intelligence: Understand which advertisers are served by competitor billboard networks based on audience overlap analysis
  • Pricing Strategy: Use competitor location performance metrics (visits, visits_avg_dwell) to inform competitive pricing and value propositions

Related Use Cases

Technical Resources