Competitors vs. Market

Question

Hi!

Usually when I do a case, I include competitors under market in my structure. However, I can see several places that people have structures that include both competitors and the market at the same level in their structure. Does this makes sense? Or is my approach a better one? Thanks.

Answer 1

Hi,

Both can work, but I personnally would recommand to cluster them into one topic adressed : Market attractivness : with the following sub bullets

market & segment size
market & segment trend
market profitability
competition landscape and intensity
...

Hope this helps

Best
Benjamin

Answer 2

Hi,

I have them as the separate buckets because I want my structure to be balanced. Each of these buckets has at least 5 bullet points to explore. I simply can't put all of them under one bucket.

Market:

Size
Growth rate
Segmentation and growth rates of the segments
Regulation and barriers
Trends
Etc

Competitors

Size (market shares)
Growth rates
Unit economics (Price, cost, margin)
Key capabilities
Products
etc.

Best!

Answer 3

I cluster them as well, if only to reduce the number of bukets I have in the business framework (I typically do a variation of Market/Competition, Product, Go To Market, Price, Customers, Company) -> Consultants get confused when you count above 3, so 6 is definitely too many.

Besides - having one section as "Market" and another one as "Competition" will often have you ask very similar questions in both branches, with the back-and-forth risk that comes with that. Not worth the risk in my mind.