Section 5: Research, knowledge management and rapid learning

Scenario 41: Turning competitor research into a sourced comparison report

Level: Intermediate · Tools: ChatGPT Deep Research; plan and country availability may vary by account

Who and in what situation

Derya, a business development specialist at the fictional SME Arma Gıda, compares three competitors’ product and distribution announcements for management every month.

How it is done today

Derya opens the sites in separate tabs, copies notes into a document, and later tries to find which page each piece of information came from.

How to do it with AI

  1. In a new ChatGPT conversation, select + > Deep research or type /Deepresearch. Specify the objective, country, date range, and expected output. [84]
  2. Add the competitors’ official domains under Sites > Manage sites. You can restrict the search to these sites or prioritize them. [84]
  3. Read the proposed plan before starting; use Edit to address missing topics. [84]
  4. When the report is ready, open the source links; separate the findings into source, date, claim, and interpretation. Download as Markdown, Word, or PDF if needed. [84]

Example prompt

Review {competitor_1}, {competitor_2}, and {competitor_3} in the {sector} sector in Türkiye over the {date_range} period. Use only publicly available sources that can be linked to. Match findings on products, distribution, and differentiation with their sources and publication dates. Mark information not found in the sources as “not found” and do not make assumptions.

Evidence and real-world example

No separate company case was used; the basis is the official document describing Deep Research’s site selection, plan review, and source-linked report features. [84]

Points to consider

A source link does not prove that an interpretation is correct. Sources may be incomplete or inaccurate; open the source for any important claim and verify it against an authoritative source. [90] OpenAI also warns that the model may fabricate sources. [91] Usage limits and Enterprise/Edu access depend on plan settings. [84]

Sources for this scenario

  1. Deep research in ChatGPT (help.openai.com)
  2. Searching the web with ChatGPT (help.openai.com)
  3. Does ChatGPT tell the truth (help.openai.com)