The One-Hour Business Plan: The Simple and Practical Way to Start Anything New

Competition is not only the basis of protection to the consumer, but is the incentive to progress.

—Herbert Hoover, 31st President of the United States

 

Module 3

Who Are Your Competitors? Competitive Positioning

Viewing Your Offering Through Your Customers' Eyes

 

And while the law of competition may be sometimes hard for the individual, it is best for the race, because it ensures the survival of the fittest in every department.

—Andrew Carnegie, Scottish-American industrialist and philanthropist

Competition helps people figure it out.

—Brian McBride, third highest all-time leading goal scorer for the United States national soccer team

The competitive positioning module was chosen next because it is most closely linked with the customer target in the prospective customer's mind. (See Figure 3.1.) While you are pitching, presenting, or marketing your offer to prospective customers, they are making evaluations, creating opinions, and making final judgments about your offering. You are extremely fortunate if they are willing to share these thoughts with you. People learn from each other the way iron forms in a blacksmith's fire: with heated exchanges, repetitive pounding, refinement, a cooling-off period, and finishing. The symbol (not the logo) of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania is the blacksmith's anvil, which symbolizes Joseph Wharton's pioneering work in the metal industry. I once owned a blacksmith shop that was more than 200 years old. While preserving ...