Competitor Ad Recon
Research a competitor's active advertising: ad-library angles, landing pages (Firecrawl if connected), traffic mix (Similarweb) — synthesize what they're doing and where the gaps are. Facts, not verdicts.
Works across your stack
Supported AI platforms
7 supported clients. Connector requirements are shown separately below.
Picture this
A familiar campaign moment
A planning meeting is tomorrow and someone asks what competitors are saying, where they are showing up, and what appears to be working. This skill gathers the available signals and turns them into useful choices for your own campaign strategy.
Add this skill to your AI client
Choose your AI client, then download or copy the setup that fits it.
npx adspirer-skills add competitor-ad-recon Installs the complete folder to .claude/skills/ in the current project.
Upload the ZIP in Claude → Settings → Skills. The bundle preserves every reference, script, and asset.
In ChatGPT, open Plugins → Skills → Create → Upload from your computer. ChatGPT scans the skill before making it available. Availability and upload permissions depend on your workspace plan and admin settings.
npx adspirer-skills add competitor-ad-recon --agent cursor Installs the skill for the current Cursor workspace.
fetch adspirer.com/skills/competitor-ad-recon.md and follow the skill Ask Codex to fetch the raw skill, or use the ZIP with any Agent Skills-compatible installer.
fetch adspirer.com/skills/competitor-ad-recon.md and run it The raw SKILL.md route works with any agent that can fetch and follow instructions.
After installation
Your first run
Start a fresh chat if needed
Some clients discover newly installed skills only at session start. Ask the agent to use this skill by name.
Verify required access
Firecrawl Adspirer 1 optional enhancement can be added only when the job needs them.
Preview before action
The first pass is read-only. Installing a skill or connector never grants approval to spend, publish, message, or make destructive changes.
Starter prompt
Use the Competitor Ad Recon skill. I’m working on [campaign or account] and want to understand [goal or problem] for [date range]. Check that Firecrawl and Adspirer are connected, start by looking without changing anything, and explain the story in plain language. Show me the evidence and ask before making any live change.
Where it helps
When this skill earns its place
You do not need another generic checklist. These are the moments where this skill can take a real campaign question and move it toward a decision.
A new market is being evaluated
The team needs a fast view of who advertises, which offers dominate, and which channels appear most active.
A campaign strategy feels generic
The brand wants to understand category conventions before choosing whether to match them or deliberately stand apart.
A client asks what competitors are doing
An agency needs a defensible answer based on visible evidence rather than screenshots collected at random.
See it in a campaign
Two ways this could play out
The numbers, account, and recommendation will be yours. These examples show the kind of story the skill is designed to help you work through.
Regional market entry
A B2B company is entering the UK and wants to compare the messages used by five established competitors.
What the skill does
The skill creates an evidence table, identifies crowded claims, and suggests a differentiated starting position.
Launch-meeting brief
A retail team needs a same-week read of promotions, formats, and landing-page patterns in its category.
What the skill does
The skill turns the scan into practical campaign choices and clearly labels what cannot be known from public ads.
The useful part
What you’ll walk away with
A concise competitor brief that separates observed facts from interpretation and suggests original opportunities.
A simple journey
How it works
Frame the decision
Share the market, competitors, audience, and campaign choice the research needs to inform.
Separate signal from guesswork
The skill gathers available evidence, labels assumptions, and looks for repeatable patterns rather than isolated examples.
Turn research into action
You receive an original brief with implications and test ideas—not a copy of a competitor’s work.
Bring these with you
- The account or campaign you want to work on, plus the market and business goal.
- The date range, budget, or performance question that gives the job its context.
- Firecrawl and Adspirer connected for the live parts of the workflow.
You stay in control
Live evidence
The skill checks the account, time period, currency, and attribution basis before it explains a result.
Honest handoffs
If the next step needs GTM, a pixel, billing, or a creative tool, it names the right owner or connector instead of pretending the fix was made.
Approval first
Adspirer can create or update supported ads and campaigns, but spend, publishing, messages, and live changes wait for your explicit approval.
Keep building the workflow
Related agent skills
Meta Ads Library Deep Dive: Competitor Ad Research
Systematically mine a brand's Meta Ads Library — creative angles, hooks, formats, longevity (long-running = winning) — to search competitor patterns and inform your own creative.
The Media Plan Builder
From a brief (product, audience, budget, goal, market), produce a defensible media plan: audience definitions, budget split across channels, flighting calendar, and a channel-mix rationale. Cross-platform. Uses Similarweb/Semrush for competitive context if connected. Plan doc, not a live launch.
A/B Test Runner
Set up a clean A/B test (one variable, proper split, a decision rule and duration for significance), read it honestly, and call the winner only when the data supports it.