Strategygram: Competition Is A Monster

A brand’s competition takes many forms even though many marketers rely on just a single positioning statement focusing on only one type of competition.

The reason for this mono-adherence can be traced back to positioning-statement templates that were created by advertising agencies and packaged-goods marketers in yester decades. In those days, when mass-media advertising was the paramount means of communication with customers, marketers were urged to be single-minded about their selling proposition in their broadcast communication.

Marketers today have many more options for commercial persuasion and for tackling multi-faceted competition. Which brings us to the question, ‘Who is your competition?’

Three questions help us triangulate the answer: What did your customer stop using or doing when they bought your product or service? What else did the customer try before making that switch to you? What would your customer use or do if your product or service didn’t exist anymore?

Competition always depends on context. Your brand’s competition is different depending upon the interaction between your target customer, the customer’s circumstances, and the alternatives available to your customer.

One way of getting to grips with competition is to start by grouping it: competitors offering the same benefit to customers with the same fundamental approach as you do; competitors who offer the same benefit but with a different approach; competitors who offer a substitute benefit with a different approach; and, finally, competition in the form of customer apathy or workaround that obviates the need for such benefits, at least for now.

Tackling these various forms of competition means that your brand must have a defined organising idea. Without that unifying concept, your brand will lack coherence as it fights different types of competition.

Competition is a multi-headed monster. But it need not be inevitably victorious. That’s why you have a strategy.

Sattar Khan

This Strategygram titled ‘Competition Is A Monster’ is part of the series I’ve created. Each Strategygram condenses one strategic thought into one image.

The series is a visual guide to strategic thinking and provides handy image prompts for brand strategy workouts. ?

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