Benchmark
Benchmarking is the mutual comparison of the quality or performance of similar products, services, organizations or marketing activities.
You could translate the English term benchmark as measure or calibration. By comparing the results of similar players side by side, you obtain a frame of reference of the degree of success compared to direct competitors or compared to the average within the same market.
Benchmarks are often part of broader surveys and tests. For example, a SWOT analysis or competitive analysis. The purpose of benchmarking is rarely just to determine the mutual ranking of subjects studied. What is also interesting is why the compared organizations, products, services or activities perform better or worse, in order to learn from this.
When performance is compared to competitors or other external measures of degree, the benchmark relies on publicly available data. A benchmark can also be conducted within an organizations, for example to compare the success of its own services, products, processes or even employees. A benchmark can also be used to test possible solutions or variants in practice. An example of this is an A/B test.
A benchmark can be a snapshot, or comparison within a specific time period. Often, however, a benchmark is conducted over a longer period of time, in part to monitor the effect of improvements over a longer period of time.
