Strategy Canvas
Visualizes competitive factors and value curves for Blue Ocean strategies.
PURPOSE
The Strategy Canvas helps companies visually analyze their competitive position and discover new strategic spaces. It makes visible where a company differs from the competition and where industry standards are blindly copied. The tool is central to the Blue Ocean Strategy, which is about creating new markets rather than competing in existing ones.
HOW TO USE
List the key competitive factors of your industry on the horizontal axis and rate them on the vertical axis for your company and the main competitors. Draw the value curves and identify factors that you can eliminate, reduce, raise, or create. Use the four action fields (Eliminate, Reduce, Raise, Create) to develop a differentiated value curve.
WHAT IT IS
The Strategy Canvas is a visual analysis instrument from the Blue Ocean Strategy by W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne. It displays the competitive factors of an industry on a horizontal axis and their intensity for various providers on the vertical axis. The resulting value curves show the strategic profile of each provider and make differentiation potential immediately visible.
EXAMPLE
Example: You work for a mid-sized hearing aid manufacturer and draw the value curves of your company and the three largest competitors on a Strategy Canvas – with factors such as price, wearing comfort, app integration, and battery life. In doing so, you discover that no provider addresses the factor of stigma-free design, and thus find a new strategic space.