competitor-alerts

# /digital-marketing-pro:competitor-alerts

## Purpose

Configure an intelligent competitor alert system that surfaces competitive changes worth knowing about while actively managing alert fatigue. Define what types of competitive changes should trigger notifications, at what significance thresholds, for which competitors, through which channels, and at what urgency tier. Competitive monitoring generates a high volume of raw change signals — most are noise that does not warrant human attention. This command transforms raw change detection into actionable competitive intelligence by applying tiered urgency rules, smart thresholds calibrated to each dimension's natural volatility, and digest batching that groups lower-priority changes into periodic summaries rather than individual pings. The result is a competitor alert pipeline that reliably surfaces high-impact competitive moves in real-time while packaging routine competitive activity into digestible periodic briefings that maintain awareness without disruption. Supports per-competitor and per-dimension alert customization so the user can watch a primary rival more closely with tighter thresholds while applying lighter monitoring to secondary and emerging competitors.

## Input Required

The user must provide (or will be prompted for):

- **Competitors to monitor**: Which tracked competitors should have alerts enabled — can be all currently monitored competitors from competitor-monitor or a specific subset. Each competitor can have fully independent alert configurations, allowing tighter trigger thresholds and higher default urgency for primary rivals versus secondary competitors. Competitors must have existing baselines from competitor-monitor to enable meaningful change detection; if any requested competitors lack baselines, the user is prompted to run competitor-monitor first to establish the reference state
- **Alert types to enable**: Which competitive change categories to monitor — `content` (new pages published, significant edits to key pages, messaging or value proposition changes), `pricing` (any pricing page change, plan restructuring, new discount offers or promotions, free trial modifications), `ads` (new campaign launches in Google Ads or Meta, major creative rotations, new advertising platform presence), `social` (mention volume spikes, sentiment shifts, viral content, significant follower growth), `ranking` (organic position changes on tracked keywords beyond the configured threshold), `serp` (featured snippet ownership changes, People Also Ask presence shifts, knowledge panel updates, AI overview citation changes), `positioning` (correlated changes across multiple dimensions suggesting a deliberate strategic shift). Select all for comprehensive alerting or choose specific types per competitor based on competitive priorities
- **Urgency tiers per alert type**: Assignment of each enabled alert type to an urgency tier — `critical` (immediate real-time notification for high-impact competitive moves demanding fast response), `warning` (batched into daily digest for notable but non-urgent changes requiring awareness), or `info` (collected into weekly digest for background intelligence and pattern recognition). If not specified by the user, defaults are applied based on typical competitive impact patterns and dimension sensitivity
- **Notification channel**: Where to deliver alerts — Slack channel name (e.g., #competitor-alerts, #marketing-intel, #urgent-competitive) or email address. Supports specifying different channels per urgency tier for intelligent routing — e.g., critical alerts to #urgent-alerts with @channel mention for immediate visibility, warning alerts to #competitor-daily for morning review, and info alerts bundled into the #competitor-weekly digest. For Slack delivery, requires the Slack MCP server to be connected with posting permissions on the target channels
- **Alert mode**: Delivery timing preference per urgency tier — `real-time` (alerts sent immediately upon change detection, best suited for critical-tier alerts only), `daily-digest` (all alerts of the tier batched and delivered once per day at a specified time, typically morning), or `weekly-digest` (all alerts batched into a comprehensive weekly competitive intelligence briefing). Recommended configuration mixes modes by tier — critical alerts in real-time for immediate competitive response, warning alerts in daily digest for daily planning context, info alerts in weekly digest for strategic awareness
- **Custom thresholds (optional)**: Override the default change significance thresholds per alert type to tune sensitivity — e.g., "alert on ranking changes greater than 3 positions instead of the default 5", "trigger social alerts at 1.5x baseline mention volume instead of 2x", "alert on any content change to competitor homepages and pricing pages, not just significant edits", "lower ad alert threshold to include creative refreshes not just new campaigns". Allows fine-tuning based on competitive intensity, industry pace, and the user's tolerance for alert volume versus comprehensiveness

## Process

1. **Load brand context and existing competitor monitoring configuration**: Read `~/.claude-marketing/brands/_active-brand.json` for the active slug, then load `~/.claude-marketing/brands/{slug}/profile.json`. Apply brand competitive landscape context, industry vertical, and target market definitions. Load existing competitor monitoring data from competitor-tracker.py — competitor profiles with current baselines, scan schedules with frequencies, historical change logs, and any previously configured alert rules that may need updating rather than creating from scratch. Verify that all requested competitors have active baselines with recent data; if any lack baselines, prompt the user to run competitor-monitor first to establish the reference state required for meaningful change detection. Check for agency SOPs at `~/.claude-marketing/sops/`.
2. **Configure aler