I 've always tought that monitoring competitors business help a Better planning of yours.
For example checking competitors social networks pages (likes, views, comments) can be very useful to estimate their business cap.
Do you monitor your competitors? If so do you use some tool?
Email newsletters and RSS should do the trick. And maybe occasionally dropping into their social spaces.
Though personally I avoid paying too much attention to competitors, I find it's better just to focus in on building the product I want.