COMPETITION Flashcards
major forms of competition
BRAND AND FUNCTIONAL
is direct competition with other products or services. You are
competing with similar products/services for the same customers ta similar prices.
BRAND COMPETITION
means products or services that fill the same need to serve
the same function as yours. They may not offer direct competition; you may be competing
with a substitute.
FUNCTIONAL COMPETITION
How will your product or service be compared?
compare and contrast your innovation to the
current products or solutions considered to be either the state of the art, the most popular
of their kind today, and/ or the most likely alternative technology that prospective users
might adopt. Find your ideal market positioning by contrasting your features, functions
and value with those from these competitors.
List your innovation’s brand and functional competitors. Find your competitors
through internet research and talking to others. Many companies provide a scorecard to
show how they stack up to their competition; use these lists to identify additional
competitors
PROFILE YOUR COMPETITORS
It’s time to discover how your competitions do business. Understand which of their
approaches are successful and which cause more challenges.
BUSINESS MODEL
Asking questions of your competitors’ customers can give you great business
intelligence.
CUSTOMER INTERVIEWS
is about value delivery—an exchange of value between buyers and
seller.
MARKETING
you must understand the needs of your customers.
The customer, not the seller, determines value. Benefits are more important than
features. The seller must watch features to what the customer says he or she values
VALUE DELIVERY
Now is the time to map those features and benefits to those your competition. Identifying
your competitive strengths helps you better understand how your product can effectively
compete in your markets.
And anything else about your product you think is important. You want to know if
other people care about the features or benefit.
COMPARING TECHNOLOGY FEATURES AND FUNCTIONS
You want as many competitive advantages as possible. Recall that the market of
the baby-formula machine had a low-cost advantage, as well as market differentiation
(included only the features mom said they wanted).
YOUR ADVANTAGES
Though you don’t want to compete on price alone, having a cost advantage along with
other advantages puts your product/service ahead of others. Assess where costs can be
saved against that of your competition:
Unit cost
Transaction cost
Marketing expenses
Overheard expenses
COST
Some of the many ways you can differentiate your product from that of your
competition:
Product quality
Service quality
Brand image
DIFFERENTIATION
You can also be competitive through marketing advantages:
Market share
Brand awareness
Distribution
Sales coverage
MARKETING
By organizing your information, you can quickly answer questions about your
competitive advantage. It reduces the likelihood you’ll forget an important act that could
change your approach.
Using your notes and research, take the time to complete a Features Comparison
Matrix. This is for your internal use, not for the release to the public. Be as objective as
you can, and ask your team for input. List all major features you have to discover to be
important, even if you don’t support them
CREATE A COMPETITIVE MATRIX
