Ansoff is a professor of strategic management at the University of California, American International University. When studying the business strategy of an enterprise, he put forward two major factors that an enterprise should first consider when formulating its business strategy: products (existing products and new products) and markets (existing markets and new markets). In the field of competitive intelligence, this method is used to find competitors, and now Ansoff matrix is used to analyze the competitors and competitive situation faced by university libraries. Ansoff matrix for finding competitors in university libraries;

From Ansoff matrix, we can see the different levels of competition faced by university libraries, and analyze the competitors at different levels respectively:

Class D competitors are competitors with different services and different users compared with the university libraries studied, so it is difficult to become direct competitors in a short time. Such competitors can be willing competitors.

Class C competitors are competitors who provide the same service but have different users. Because of the existence of market barriers, such competitors are potential competitors. If market barriers disappears, such potential competitors will become direct competitors (namely Class A competitors). Such competitors include libraries of other universities and public libraries. With the development of interlibrary loan and some libraries' online services, the services of university libraries are no longer limited to their own students, but begin to expand to students from other schools. In this case, the market barriers of university library information service is not so obvious, and it is easy to switch to class A competitors.

Class B competitors are competitors who provide different services but have the same users. Such competitors belong to parallel competitors. If they want to provide the same services as university libraries by using the relationship they have established with users or the good reputation they have established, they will become direct competitors. Such competitors include bookstores, information consulting industry, online bookstores, search engines and mail customization; If the bookstore provides reading services, it will become a direct competitor of the library.

Class A competitors are competitors who provide the same services and users. These competitors belong to direct competitors, including digital libraries, and competitors transformed from Class B and Class C. According to Ansoff matrix analysis, the level of each competitor is summarized as shown in the following figure: