# Competitor ad intelligence Human Guide

## What This Is For
Scrape competitor ads from Meta and Google, analyze creative patterns, reverse-engineer landing page funnels, and produce a full strategic teardown — hooks, formats, positioning bets. It gives the agent a clearer input/output frame for paid media: what context to ask for, what decisions to make, and what usable artifact to return.

Use this as a human-readable version of the Competitor ad intelligence agent skill. It is meant for marketers, operators, founders, and other non-coders who want the workflow without reading agent-specific implementation instructions.

## When To Use This
- Use this when you need a repeatable process for competitor ad intelligence.
- Use this when the task needs judgment, examples, constraints, or a clear output format rather than a one-off prompt.
- Use this when you want to hand an AI assistant enough context to produce a usable marketing artifact.

## When Not To Use This
- Do not use this when you only need a quick factual answer.
- Do not use this when the work depends on private data you cannot share with the assistant.
- Do not use this as a replacement for legal, compliance, financial, or medical review.

## What You Need Before Starting
- The goal or business outcome you want.
- The audience, customer segment, or market context.
- Any source material the assistant should respect, such as notes, briefs, examples, URLs, or brand guidance.
- Constraints such as tone, length, channel, deadline, region, or approval requirements.
- A clear definition of what a good final answer should look like.

## Step-By-Step Workflow
1. State the job clearly: "Use the Competitor ad intelligence guide to help me with..."
2. Add context: audience, goal, offer, channel, source material, and constraints.
3. Ask the assistant to identify missing inputs before producing the final output.
4. Have the assistant follow the skill-specific guidance below.
5. Review the result against the final checklist and ask for revisions where needed.

## Skill-Specific Guidance
- "What ads are my competitors running?"
- "Tear down [competitor]'s ad strategy"
- "Find new creative angles for our paid campaigns"
- "Reverse-engineer [competitor]'s paid funnel"
- "What hooks are working in [our space]?"
- "Audit the ad landscape before we launch"
- "Find weaknesses in [competitor]'s ad strategy"
- "What format — video, image, carousel — is dominant in our category?"
- **Competitor names + domains** (e.g., `apollo.io`, `clay.run`)
- **Your product/domain** — for comparison framing
- **Channels:** Meta only, Google only, or both? (default: both)
- **Standard:** Ad scrape + creative analysis + landing page analysis

## Decision Points And Nuance
The original skill emphasizes: When to Use, Phase 0: Intake, Phase 1: Scrape Meta Ads, Phase 2: Scrape Google Ads, Phase 3: Analyze Creative Patterns, Hook Pattern Clustering, Format Distribution, CTA Taxonomy, Phase 4: Landing Page & Funnel Analysis, Campaign Clustering.

Use these questions to steer the work:
- What is the intended audience or buyer?
- What source material must be preserved?
- What should the assistant optimize for: clarity, persuasion, accuracy, speed, creativity, or conversion?
- What examples represent the desired quality bar?
- What should the assistant avoid?

## Common Mistakes
- **Overcrowded angles** — If everyone leads with "save time", avoid it or be more specific
- **Underutilized proof** — Are competitors avoiding specific proof points you could own?
- Overcrowded Angles (Avoid or Differentiate)
- No API keys required. This skill uses publicly accessible ad libraries and web search.

## Copy-And-Paste Prompt
```text
Use the Competitor ad intelligence human guide.

My goal:
[Describe the business outcome]

Audience:
[Describe who this is for]

Context and source material:
[Paste notes, examples, links, or existing copy]

Constraints:
[Tone, length, channel, timeline, must-include items, must-avoid items]

Before producing the final output, ask me for any missing information that would materially improve the result.
```

## Final Checklist
- [ ] The output matches the original goal.
- [ ] The audience and context are reflected in the answer.
- [ ] Important constraints and source material were preserved.
- [ ] The assistant made the relevant decisions explicit.
- [ ] The final artifact is ready to use, review, or hand to the next person.

## Source
This guide was generated from the gooseworks-ai/goose-skills skill entry for `competitor-ad-intelligence`.

## Source Skill Notes
These notes preserve the nuance from the original skill. Use them as supporting reference when the workflow above feels too generic.

# Competitor Ad Intelligence

Scrape competitor ads from Meta and Google, analyze creative patterns, reverse-engineer landing page funnels, and produce a full strategic teardown — hooks, formats, positioning bets, vulnerabilities, and counter-plays.

**Core principle:** A competitor's ad portfolio is a window into their growth strategy. Long-running ads reveal what converts. New ads reveal what they're testing. Landing pages reveal their positioning bets. The best ad creative teams start with evidence from what's already working, then differentiate.

## When to Use

- "What ads are my competitors running?"
- "Tear down [competitor]'s ad strategy"
- "Find new creative angles for our paid campaigns"
- "Reverse-engineer [competitor]'s paid funnel"
- "What hooks are working in [our space]?"
- "Audit the ad landscape before we launch"
- "Find weaknesses in [competitor]'s ad strategy"
- "What format — video, image, carousel — is dominant in our category?"

## Phase 0: Intake

Gather from the user:

1. **Competitor names + domains** (e.g., `apollo.io`, `clay.run`)
2. **Your product/domain** — for comparison framing
3. **Channels:** Meta only, Google only, or both? (default: both)
4. **Depth level:**
   - **Standard:** Ad scrape + creative analysis + landing page analysis
   - **Deep:** Standard + historical comparison + funnel reconstruction + counter-plays
5. **Product category** — helps frame analysis
6. **Known competitor landing pages?** — any URLs already spotted in their ads

## Phase 1: Scrape Meta Ads

For each competitor domain, scrape ads from Meta Ad Library.

Use `web_search` to find competitor ads in the Meta Ad Library (publicly accessible, no API key needed):

```
web_search: site:facebook.com/ads/library "[competitor_name]"
web_search: "[competitor_name]" Meta Ad Library active ads
web_search: "[competitor_name]" facebook ads examples
```

You can also visit the Meta Ad Library directly: `https://www.facebook.com/ads/library/?active_status=active&ad_type=all&country=US&q=<competitor_name>`

Use `fetch_webpage` on the Ad Library URL to extract ad details if your agent supports it.

> **Note:** Apify actors for Meta Ad Library scraping exist but are unreliable as of April 2026 due to Meta's anti-scraping measures. Use `web_search` as the primary method.

**Collect per ad:**
- Ad copy (headline + primary text)
- Visual type (image / video / carousel)
- CTA button text
- Landing page URL
- Active duration (first seen, still running or stopped)
- Platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Audience Network)
- Ad variations (A/B tests — same landing page, different creative)

## Phase 2: Scrape Google Ads

For each competitor domain, scrape ads from Google Ads Transparency Center.

Use `web_search` to find competitor ads in Google Ads Transparency Center (publicly accessible):

```
web_search: site:adstransparency.google.com "[competitor_name]"
web_search: "[competitor_name]" Google Ads transparency
web_search: "[competitor_name]" google search ads examples
```

You can also visit directly: `https://adstransparency.google.com/?search_text=<competitor_name>`

Use `fetch_webpage` on the Transparency Center URL to extract ad details if your agent supports it.

**Collect per ad:**
- Headline variants (up to 3)
- Description lines
- Ad type (Search / Display / YouTube / Shopping)
- Landing page URL
- Geographic targeting (if visible)