---
name: discovery-competitive-benchmark
description: >
  Run a competitive benchmark and extract Gold Nuggets for the Steal phase of discovery.
  Use when the user wants to analyze competitors, says "fais un benchmark concurrentiel",
  "analyse les solutions existantes", "steal phase", or "trouve des gold nuggets".
---

# Skill: discovery-competitive-benchmark

## Trigger
Use this skill when the user wants to run a competitive benchmark during a discovery — e.g. "fais un benchmark concurrentiel", "analyse les solutions existantes", "steal phase", "what are competitors doing on X", "trouve des gold nuggets pour ma discovery".

## Context
At Mayday, the Steal phase (step 5 of FOCUSED) is dedicated to benchmarking existing solutions before designing anything. The goal is NOT to copy, but to identify patterns, UX models, and "Gold Nuggets" — the 5 most inspiring solutions that can inform Mayday's design.

Benchmark sources to cover:
1. **Direct competitors / ecosystem actors** (tools in the same space as Mayday)
2. **Usual suspects** (industry leaders that likely solve a similar problem: Notion, Stripe, Linear, Figma, Google, etc.)
3. **Adjacent industries** (tools from other sectors solving the same underlying UX challenge)

> Pro tip: Use web search to find changelogs, product documentation, and reviews — these are more accurate than marketing pages.

## What to do

### Step 1 — Gather context
Ask the user for the following if not already provided:
- What is the FUC (First Use Case) or problem being solved?
- Which direct competitors / ecosystem actors should be checked?
- Any specific UX patterns or capabilities to focus on?

### Step 2 — Run the benchmark
For each product analyzed, produce a structured entry:

**[Product Name] — [One-line description]**
- **Why relevant:** How does this relate to the FUC?
- **How they solve it:** Describe the UX flow or feature in concrete terms
- **Key UX patterns:** The specific interaction patterns worth noting
- **Limitations / feedback:** What users complain about, what's missing
- **🔗 Source:** Link to documentation, changelog, or review

Analyze at minimum:
- 2–3 direct competitors
- 2–3 "usual suspects" (Notion, Linear, Figma, Stripe, etc. depending on the problem)
- 1–2 from an adjacent industry if relevant

### Step 3 — Extract the 5 Gold Nuggets

After analyzing all products, extract the **5 most inspiring patterns or solutions** — things that should influence Mayday's design:

**🥇 Gold Nugget 1: [Short title]**
> [What it is, why it's powerful, what Mayday should steal from it]

Repeat for 5 nuggets total.

### Step 4 — Key patterns synthesis

End with a brief synthesis section:
- **Recurring patterns across solutions:** What do most products do the same way?
- **Gaps / opportunities:** What are competitors NOT doing well that Mayday could own?
- **Recommendation:** Based on the benchmark, what approach makes the most sense for Mayday?

## Output format
- One section per product analyzed
- Then the 5 Gold Nuggets highlighted
- Then the synthesis
- Use headers, bold text, and emoji for scanability
- Include real links and source references where possible
- Write in the user's language
- Be specific about UX patterns — describe the actual interaction, not just "it has a good UI"

## Example Gold Nugget format (from Knowledge Quality benchmark)
**🥇 Gold Nugget: Cursor — Multi-file diff review**
> When an AI agent modifies multiple files, Cursor shows each impacted file in a sidebar with a before/after diff, letting the user accept or reject changes file by file. The key insight: each change includes a brief rationale ("why this file was touched"), which builds trust. For Mayday: this "impacted document list + rationale + per-item accept/reject" is the exact mental model for KB quality recommendations.